Not even Magic can explain This
by Pikapixie The Demigod
Summary: To a Mudblood, the world of magic is new, shocking, and real: there is danger, and there is wonder, and there is death, and there is life. And there, above all else, is friendship. Potions may explode, detentions might be given, and dark evil wizards seeking to destroy the world may show up, but nothing can stop them now.
1. Chapter 1

Lily was slow in waking. When she did, she didn't open her eyes right away, grimacing automatically at the throbbing pain pulsing in the back of her skull. But there was a noise nearby, irritating and persistent, and despite herself, Lily eventually opened her eyes. She could've sworn she'd turned her alarm clock off...

The world came into a blurry kind of focus, but the first thing she noticed was the color white: the paint on the walls, the ceiling, as well as everything else in the room; all of it was _far_ too bright. The second thing Lily noticed, as her eyes focused better, was the source of the noise: the beeping of a heart monitor.

... _Why_ was she hooked up to a heart monitor? Nothing she remembered even remotely explained...

"I see you're awake," came a smooth, aged voice from her left, and she flinched, head whipping to that side despite her headache.

It was an older man, she realized. A much older man- to be honest, he kind of looked like Merlin, with a long white beard and dark robes. He was seated in a chair by her hospital bed- and she still had no clue at all why she was in a hospital bed- looking calm.

Lily said nothing, completely speechless, but said up slightly. Even if she couldn't remember why she was in a hospital room, she did know she had no clue who this guy was, and surely the hospital staff wouldn't let some random stranger dressed like some kind of wizard in her room without supervision?

She couldn't think of anything better to say, Lily ventured out, "... Are you a wizard?"

Of course he wasn't a wizard- there was no such thing- but she honestly couldn't think of anything else to say. Her brain was still muddled, fuzzy and hurting. So she wasn't expecting the flicker of surprise to cross the old man's face.

"Perceptive one, aren't you?" he asked in a pleasant tone, and Lily blinked.

"Okay... so I'm Lily, I don't really know who you are, or why I'm here." It was more of a statement then a question, really, but she was genuinely confused. The last thing she remembered was...

She'd been at school, and she'd been really mad... and that was all she could really remember. There were another few moments of quiet before she even remembered why- oh, yeah, she thought suddenly. They cut my hair.

"Did I knock myself out with pure rage?" she asked curiously.

"In a manner of speaking, I suppose you could say that." His eyes crinkled in a merry sort of smile. "My name is Albus Dumbledore. I am the Headmaster at Hogwarts' school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. And you, my dear, are a witch."

 **...**

Everything had been normal up until now. Pleasant, even; it was her birthday and school had just ended days ago, Lexi had woken up late and they'd had a huge breakfast, and had fun all evening, and plans had been made to go out to eat at Burger King or the like.

Normal up until the door'd been knocked on, and when her father went to answer it, Lexi assumed it was just some post, or maybe a neighbor, or something else like that, up until the door slammed back shut again, hard enough that she flinched.

Eventually her dad walked back into the living room looking annoyed, and she asked apprehensively, "Um, who- who was that?"

"Nobody," her dad answered, sitting back down on the couch next to her and reaching for the remote to start up the movie she'd paused in his wake. "Just some weirdo. Don't ever answer the door if we're not home, okay?"

"Um. Okay."

And then he lifted the remote, and with a bang that had her yelping and pulling her legs up onto the couch, a woman appeared in front of the TV.

"Well, that was rude," she chastised.

Lexi might have screamed again, but it caught up in her throat, and she ended up with a somewhat strangled, "Dad?"

He was already on his feet, looking livid, TV remote still in hand although he hadn't actually managed to start up the television. "Who _are_ you? What do you want? How did you get in here?"

The woman looked pinched, like she might call him out again for being rude, but sighed instead. She was an older lady, face set with wrinkles, hair pulled back. She was wearing the strangest clothes, like a formal black bathrobe, but without a tie and looking a lot less comfortable. And she was tall, Lexi noticed faintly. And she'd just appeared in the middle of the living room out of thin air.

"I'm the Transfiguration professor at Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. You may call me Minnerva."

"Transfiguration?" Lexi had never heard that word before in her life.

"Get out of my house," her father said. "I'm going to call the police."

"How does one bring this up subtly?" Minnerva mused, then sighed again. "In all my years, I have never quite come up with a sure-fire way of explaining this to muggle families. Here."

She reached into one of her giant bathrobe sleeves and came out holding a long stick. Lexi, not sure what to do aside from sit on the couch and try to sink into the upholstery, just watched as she raised in up into the air at where her dad was dialing on his cell phone and slashed it sharply. It flashed red at the tip, and then the color shot out like a laser beam, cutting straight into the phone.

And suddenly her father was holding a breadstick. The kind you would find in a restaurant: certainly not a phone. Lexi gaped, and her father swore loudly, dropped it on the carpeted floor.

"Miss Talbot," the woman said, addressing her personally, and took a few steps closer while her dad was distracted by the food, and reached again into her bathrobe, but instead came out with a big white envelope, and held it out to her. "You're a witch, and hereby invited to study at Hogwarts, in Scotland."

Several thoughts ran through her head, the first of which being, _Scotland?_ _I've never been to Scotland._ And the second being, _Huh?_ _Witch?_

 **...**

The plane ride to Britain had been... awkward, to say the least. Both her mom _and_ dad had been along for the ride, for one thing, and that was always awkward anywhere; but there was also the fact that all three of them had still been processing the whole _magic_ thing. But the farewells had been teary and excited enough, excited on her end at least, not caring in the slightest her father's mumbling about elementary school.

And so she'd been handed over to 'Professor' McGonagall, or so she'd been told to call her, even though sometimes she messed up and said "Mrs." instead, to go shopping at a place called "Diagon Alley", which was _really_ neat because it was _magically hidden_ from the rest of the world- muggles, Mrs. McGonagall had called them- and for once she didn't mind how crowded the place was, admiring everything, all the old-fashioned looking buildings with things flying through the air, zipping through display cases.

(Well, she minded a little bit, and felt really self-conscious in her "muggle clothes" and felt really out of place, but she ignored it, because everyone seemed to be clearing a path for Mrs. McGonagall.)

She didn't recognize the money in her own bag- galleons? What?- but that was fine, because Mrs.- Professor- McGonagall led her through each shop they went to for the various things on her list, for odd things like cauldrons and glass vials and gold-colored scales, even a small telescope; thick black robes that felt like a really complicated dress, cloaks, a pointy wizard hat that made her laugh. Gloves made with _dragon scales._

They also had to buy schoolbooks, but for once, they actually looked interesting. They went to two different stores for the books, a place called _Flourish and Blotts_ and another called _Obscurus Books._ And they bought quill pens, things Lexi had always, _always_ wanted to use, parchment (paper) and a bunch of other things, and a big old trunk to put everything into.

Finally there were only two things left on the list: A wand, and then the optional pet and she was _so_ getting a pet, she'd had her own spending money transferred into galleons.

Still, though. Wand first. _Wand first._

God, she was getting a _wand._

There was a big, dusty old store that looked like Flourish and Blotts, but less busy and filled with boxes and piles of random sticks- wands- instead of books. It smelled like cut wood shavings and cardboard, and it was kind of dark, with light pouring in from the windows but not getting anywhere near the high ceiling.

"Mister Ollivander," Professor McGonagall called into the empty store, and from way in the back, behind the pay counter, a voice replied, "Just a moment, just a moment!"

Lexi stood there awkwardly, still in her regular clothes, and shifted the trunk so it leaned against the ground, staring at all the wands. Each one looked different: different shapes, different angles, different colors. They were all made out of different things, she thought.

And then the sound of footsteps had her looking up, to see a man even older looking than Professor McGonagall, with big bright eyes in the darkness of the store. "Why, hello, young witch," he said pleasantly. "I don't believe I recognize you."

"I'm a-" she struggled for a moment, frowning, trying to remember, before smiling shyly. "I'm a muggle-born."

"Can I ask your name?" he said kindly, and when looking up at Mrs. McGonagall had the older woman nodding, she looked back at Ollivander and twisted her fingers together nervously in front of her. "I'm Lexi Talbot. Um. Alexandria Talbot, but call me Lexi."

"Well, Miss Talbot," he said. "Let's find you a wand."

They tried several, with Ollivander explaining the bits and pieces of each and every one- cores and lengths and woods and flexibilities- each one different. She startled each time at the rush each wand brought- a rush that rushed out when she so much as waved it, even if she knocked over a few things in the process.

And finally one didn't knock things over, she didn't get the chance to try, because the rush turned into a warmth, a stagnant stirring in her whole body coming from that stick. This wand felt... _friendly._ Like it was happy to see her, even though Lexi _knew_ that made no sense.

But Ollivander seemed to understand, because he merely hummed in thought. "Yew wood, dragon heartstring core, eleven and a half inches, slightly springy," he said, taking it from her hands, at which she had to fight the urge to grab it back. "Interesting wand for someone like you."

"Why?"

"This," he said, "is a powerful wand. I don't sell very many yew wands at all," he continued, and handed it back. Lexi struggled not to grab it to her chest, because that would look weird. It was just a wand, no matter how crazy that sounded. "Let alone with dragon heartstring cores. But wands choose their owners. I expect great things from you, Miss Talbot."

They paid for the wand and left, waving goodbye to the friendly old wandmaker. Lexi didn't put it away until they made it to the pet-shop, _Magical Menagerie,_ a surprisingly small store for having so many animals squawking and barking and mewling. Most of these places seemed small, narrow but deep. This place was filled with boxes and cages, with wide-eyed owls and cats and weasels and strange things she didn't recognize. There was a turtle in the front, shell bejeweled, and she cringed at the price. Whatever a Galleon was worth, that was a _lot_ of them.

The Professor let her wander the store, which she did until she started to feel uncomfortable making her wait and circling the store again and again. She didn't want a cat, because she already had a cat at home- sickly and unable to travel, but her baby wouldn't like other cats. So it was either an owl or a toad, both of which sounded intriguing: but her dad was getting an owl, Professor McGonagall was picking out a well-trained one so they could communicate...

These toads were not like regular toads, she realized as she was drawn again and again to those sections. They were bigger, for one thing, and not all of them were toads, there were frogs too, but they seemed more... intelligent. They watched back, and when she held them they stayed put mostly. Like a trained pet rather than some random frog.

So she held them all, avoiding some and drawn to others, until eventually she came across one she liked within her Ten-Galleon budget set by the Professor: a still small- and by small she meant a little bigger than her palm, but the sign said it would get bigger- young frog that was mostly white with a bumpy brown-splattered back and grey forelegs. The sign called in a "Giant Burrowing Frog" even though it looked more like a toad. Eight Galleons.

So she shyly brought the whole terrarium up like she saw the other kids doing with the cat and owl cages to McGonagall, who only raised an eyebrow at her choice and led her to the counter to pay. Lexi's heart pounded the whole way. Her father would call this a waste of money, a toad, but she _liked_ this one that seemed to like her too.

"What are you going to name it, honey?" the saleswoman asked curiously as she rung it up. "I don't get too many young witches buying toads these days."

Even though she'd thought of a name while staring at the frog to see if she wanted her- mind spinning with meaningful names, something worthy of a magic white frog, and coming up with myths- Lexi still stuttered a bit, scuffing her feet nervously, before finally answering, "Iris."

"Like the flower?"

"No, like the Egyptian goddess Iris," she corrected automatically, and winced at the blank look she got, shutting her mouth until the terrarium got handed back to her, with little baubles she'd gotten with the extra galleons to make it homier for a frog. This she had to carry.

"Here you go, honey."

"Thank you," she said, holding the terrarium close to her chest, and then they left that store, too: en route for a place called "King's Cross Station".

 **...**

It was with a sense of trepidation that Lily left _The Leaky Cauldron_ on her own, leaving her father finally behind to finish whatever conversation he'd been so dead-set on having.

She sort of immediately regretted it- the crowds were huge, the people were bigger, it was noisy, and she looked sorely out of place in her nice clothes in all these robes- but she steeled herself and took the second step out anyway, supplies list clutched in one hand.

And realized she had no idea where to go.

Lily had been to enough fancy dinners with her parents to know how to be polite, despite what everyone else thought. So after a few moments staring at the buildings, she sought out help, eventually calling out to the closest person to her- a taller man with long blond hair.

"Excuse me, sir, you wouldn't happen to know the place that has the uniforms?"

She flinched slightly at the way he stopped, turned, and stared. Lily knew a look of disgust when she saw one, and this guy wasn't even trying to hide it, glancing down at her like some random piece of trash. "You'll be looking for Madame Maulkin's," he sniffed, and raised a hand in a vague direction. "Go straight that way. It'll be down the first alleyway."

"Okay, thank you very much, sir," she said with forced politeness, then set off in the direction he'd pointed at despite her better judgment. It wasn't like she had a clue herself beyond what he'd said.

This alley did not look... friendly, for lack of a better term. Lily wondered what a clothes shop would be doing down this way.

There was a small keening noise from below her as she tried to take a step, and Lily looked down, nearly stumbling over the small cat that'd seemingly appeared out of nowhere to tangle in her ankles. It was a calico cat, looking a little scruffy, but was persistently rubbing her ankles as she settled back standing.

"Hey, buddy," she cooed. "You lost too?"

It just mewled at her again, then slipped away between her legs, heading off in the opposite direction of the alleyway, skirting the crowds. "Hey wait, no, come back, you're gonna get run over!" Lily yelped, and then, glancing back at the alley- which she didn't particularly want to go through, anyway- chased after it.

Once she caught up, it just stopped running away, staring back up at her. And so Lily looked up, hoping she hadn't lost sight of the place the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron was at, and immediately realized she was standing in front of a store with "Madame Maulkin's" written across the top of the door.

"That lying bastard," she muttered. And then she looked down at the cat, who looked back up at her, and pushed opened the door to head inside.

Right in the front there were a bunch of chairs, probably for waiting customers. A waiting room, without the "room". Farther inside, Lily could see that the place was bustling with people and robes, some of them not hanging on anything particular she could see, just hovering or skidding around through the air, and nobody seemed to think that was odd.

Weird.

She was halfway through the uniform list and looking for dragonhide gloves- she'd _known_ dragons had to exist- when a voice interrupted her rummaging through the barrel.

"I don't believe animals are allowed in here," said the voice from behind her, british and snide.

Lily glanced down and, yes, sure enough, there was that calico cat, standing by her ankles. "I really hope you're talking about my cat right now," she said, then turned, one dragonscale glove in hand.

He looked to be her age, eleven or maybe twelve, wearing the same kind of black robes she was buying, with pale skin and gelled-back blond hair like he was trying to be a Greaser, but failing miserably. Like a rich kid trying to be cool, if his fancy shoes were anything to go by. Shoes were always an indicator of how much money someone had.

He raised his eyebrows haughtily, arms crossed over his chest. "And who are you? I can tell you're not from around _here,_ with _that_ accent."

Shifting her weight slightly to one side, she raised her chin. "Lillian Noir Cendrillon," she said proudly. "But I prefer to go by Lily. And yes, I'm not from around here. I'm from the Americas. Florida, to be exact."

"Draco Malfoy," he said, and from the way he stated it, Lily knew he at least thought "Malfoy" was important. "Are you here for Hogwarts as well? It's kind of odd for a witch from America to come _here."_

Lily sighed. "Well, you see, that's a bit of a long story... I need to stay out of America for a while... plus, I am _not_ going to an all-girl school, I was _not_ going to Salem."

Conversation petered out then, but it didn't really matter once another woman called out Draco's name from somewhere else in the shop. "I'll see you at Hogwarts, then, I suppose," he said, still managing to make that sound pompous, before turning on his heel and leaving.

It didn't take much longer to get the rest of the things and pay before leaving the shop, and this time she looked on her own through the stores to find what she needed, immediately searching for her textbooks and supplies and a trunk and a few extra notebooks and parchment with the Galleons her father had exchanged for. With everything said and done save for the wand- the cat was still following her around- she headed off for "Ollivanders".

The store was thin but deep, and only dimly lit. There was no one save for an old man standing behind the counter, examining what looked like a wand from the doorway.

"... Excuse me, sir," Lily said haltingly. "I'm here to... buy a wand... I guess."

"Yes, yes, come in," he- she was assuming this was Ollivander- said, glancing up from his wand.

And she did. He took into account her measurements, asked a few odd-end questions, and pulled out a few boxes with wands to try out.

... And that's when everything went downhill.

When the first wand exploded in her face, she was stunned, mortified, and hoping this was at least somewhat normal. But when the smoke cleared and she could see Ollivander's face- she knew it wasn't.

"I've only seen this kind of reaction- a few times, in my life," he said carefully, taking the nub of wand left in her hand cautiously. There were splinters all over the counter.

"... And... what happened to those witches and wizards?"

"Most of them are most likely in Azkaban," he said, and Lily didn't know what "Azkaban" was, but it didn't sound good or pleasant.

"... I think you should be aware that the first time I used magic I blew up a school," she said, still embarrassed and now a little nervous. "That- that should probably be taken into account."

"Oh, this does not bode well..."

They went through four more wands- only one other exploding, but the rest had some pretty bad reactions as well- before finding one that felt slightly more right than others, but still seemed kind of unstable.

"Elm wood, Phoenix feather core, ten and three quarters inches, slightly yielding." Ollivander nodded. "This should be durable enough for you, I hope."

"I can pay for those wands, just so you know," she said somewhat meekly.

 **...**

"... And that's how I nearly blew up Ollivander's shop," Lily concluded, and sat back in the compartment seat.

She'd been right in her former assumption that he was, well, _loaded._ Or at the very least, his family had influence. If the two practical body guards were anything to go by- she knew the difference between an ally and a lackey- or grunt would be a better word.

She'd found this compartment pretty quickly, and it was the first semi-empty one she'd come across. After being introduced to his two 'friends' Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle, she'd been asked- well, ordered, more like, and so she'd humored them- to recant the "long story" she'd mentioned in the robe store, and eventually that had devolved into blowing up wands.

"Bloody hell," Crabbe muttered.

"Not exactly what I was thinking when I apparently woke up from a coma, but, yeah."

Draco's jaw worked for a second, eyes flashing irritably. "You're a _mudblood?"_ he snapped out at last, sounding vehement.

"I have _no_ idea what that means, but it sounds offensive and I don't like your tone." Lily narrowed her eyes. From below her seat, the cat she'd met in Diagon Alley mewled quietly.

There was a silence.

"Well, I ain't fucking moving, I'm comfy." Lily said at last, and all three boys flinched. "So you can either suck it up or switch compartments."

The compartment door slid open suddenly. Another younger girl, probably a first-year like herself with short, bobbed brown hair. Her eyes flickered about before finally settling on the floor. "Excuse me," she asked the carpet. "Have you seen a- a toad? A boy named Neville's lost his."

"Um..." Lily paused, contemplating for a moment whether or not to say 'yes' and point to the three boys in front of her. "No, I haven't seen a toad. Sorry."

"Oh. Okay. Thanks anyway," the girl said, and hurried to close the door. As soon as she did, Lily recognized her accent- or the lack of it, depending on your perspective. But by the time she called, "Wait, are you American?" the girl had already moved on down the hall, shadow disappearing from the windows.

 **...**

If he moved, it would mean _she_ won. So most of the train ride passed in a rather awkward angry stare-down during which she completely ignored the three of them.

First, he'd thought she was a Weasely, from her red hair and muggle clothing. But when she'd turned around in that shop and _spoke,_ Draco had realized immediately that she was no such thing, from her strange accent. American. Draco had thought that, perhaps, she was from a pureblooded wizarding family in America, and that was why she could choose which school to attend.

But according to her story about blowing up a school- part of a bloody _muggle_ school, apparently- she hadn't known she was even magical until being confronted by the Headmaster. She wasn't even a half-blood.

"You may as well leave," he said confidently, but even though she looked at him suddenly, it didn't look to be because she'd heard him.

"Honestly, if you think you can intimidate me, I've dealt with way worse. Way, way, way worse. As I said before, suck it up or get lost." Before he could come up with a suitable response, she tilted her head. "By the by, I think I met your father earlier. I mean, I might be wrong, but you guys do look _slightly_ similar- same stuck up face, platinum blond hair, shoes. Which are arguably nice."

Had that mudblood just insulted his father, and then say he had nice shoes?

 _"What?"_ he said, baffled, trying to sound offended.

"Also, do you know where _Azkaban_ is?" she asked suddenly, sitting all the way up. "Ollivander said a lot of people he'd met like me ended up in Azkaban, and I don't know what that is. It doesn't sound nice, though."

 **...**

The train ride had been a long one, and they never _had_ found that toad of Neville's, which made her feel kind of bad. She'd just gotten hers, and would've hated to lose her. Bu she'd managed to wrangle into her robes, and had passed e better part of an hour reading before the other boy had found her for help in the first place.

Now she was being led by a giant bearded man named Hagrid to an almost ominous dark lake, but then it was dark outside without it, so she figured it looked like a nice enough lake during the day. Beside her walked Neville, the only other person she'd actually had a conversation with on the train aside from a very one-sided and distracted exchange with a girl called Hermoine.

"I like your frog," Neville said beside her. "What kind is it?"

"Giant Burrowing Frog, I think," she said with a shrug, looking down in her terrarium where Iris was seemingly sleeping. "I dunno, I thought it was a toad at first- are we getting in those boats?"

"I'm not sure," was Neville's only answer, but then Hagrid was bellowing for everyone to get into the boats, so there was that question answered.

They loaded on carefully, several kids to a boat, and she just tried her hardest not to trip on the hem of her robes, something she'd already done twice and didn't feel like doing into a lake. She and Neville sat on the back row and watched as they went across the lake, talking a little more about frogs and toads, but he knew more than she did, so she ended up just listening.

There were a few kids, if she looked around at all the boats and focused at the lantern lights, that looked really nervous. She wondered if they knew something about the lake that she didn't, and tried to banish the thought of sea monsters breaching to eat the flimsy little wooden rowboats.

But they got to the other side without incidence, and eventually they were all filed out of the boats. Lexi slipped a few times but didn't fall, and eventually, when she turned to wait for Neville, she stood next to Hagrid, and wanted to shrink. But then Neville came up, and Hagrid boomed, "Oy, you there!" And she realized he was talking to Neville, who shrunk as well until he finished, "Is this yer' toad?"

"Trevor!" he yelped happily, lunging forward to grab and looking much happier as he returned with a small, dark brown toad. "It's too bad you left yours on the train," he said earnestly. "I think they'll get on."

She laughed as they were led up to to an enormous, medieval looking castle, complete with spires and stonework and giant windows. She'd never seen a castle. Lexi felt horribly small next to it, but excited to be _living_ in one, so far away from home. She was a _witch._ A muggle-born. Free. "Maybe so!"

They stopped at the massive door, and even from her place a few people back from it, she could clearly see Hagrid as he reached up with one huge hand and knocked three times, the bangs ringing like gun shots. She wondered how he was so _big._ Was it a magical thing?

She had to be prepared for anything. Most of these other kids were from magical families, and so they would know all about magic, and she didn't want to be the one who freaked out about everything. She wouldn't be caught of guard. Magic was a whole new rule for this game.

The door swung open immediately to reveal Mrs. McGonagall, dressed in pretty emerald green robes. Her eyes cut across them like she was judging them all, and after a few moments, she nodded.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," said Hagrid.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

She pulled the door wide, and Lexi _oohed_ along with the rest of her classmates, craning to get a look inside. The entrance hall was bigger than a _house._ The stone walls were lit with flaming torches, the ceiling higher than the one at Ollivander's so that she couldn't even see it, and there was a beautiful marble staircase facing them led to the upper floors.

She was so glad to be a witch.

They followed Professor McGonagall across the stone floor. Lexi looked at the decorations, all of them fitting suh a huge, old looking castle, with strange looking candles and torches, and tapestries hanging from the walls, and big windows that vanished as they got farther in. There was chatter from somewhere, a crowd like standing next to her playground, but she didn't know where it was. Either way, Mrs- Professor McGonagall led them straight to a large, empty room.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room.

"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rulebreaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

Lexi wondered now how they were possibly supposed to do that in an empty room made of stone blocks. She didn't even know if she was wearing her robes right, and had no real way of telling aside from asking Neville, who, judging by the way Mrs. McGonagall was staring him down, probably didn't know either.

"I shall return when we are ready for you," said Professor McGonagall. "Please wait quietly."

And then she left them to titter among themselves. Despite herself, Lexi turned to ask Neville what was going on, if her things were on right- she felt ridiculous in this pointed black witch hat, like she was all dressed up for Halloween, but most of the other kids wore theirs as well. "Neville? Is my thing on right?"

"I think so," he said. He was still holding Trevor.

"Are you going to have to hold Trevor for whatever this sorting thing is? Do you even know _what_ this sorting thing is?"

Neville just shrugged and looked stricken.

And then a bunch of kids screamed right behind them, and both turned suddenly to see what was going on, Lexi's heart kicking in her chest. Several people made various noises at once, screams and gasps and exclamations, but Lexi said nothing, staring wordlessly with wide eyes at the twenty or so see-through people that had just phased through the back wall.

At first she thought maybe that was a magic thing and people could phase through walls by turning intangible, but then Neville murmured, "Wow, ghosts," beside her.

 _Ghosts?_

Pearly-white and slightly transparent, they floated across the room, completely ignoring the first years. They seemed to be arguing in hushed voices between themselves. What looked like a fat little monk was saying: "Forgive and forget, I say, we ought to give him a second chance -"

"My dear Friar, haven't we given Peeves all the chances he deserves?" a ghost wearing a ruff and tights said indignantly. "He gives us all a bad name and you know, he's not really even a ghost - I say, what are you all doing here?"

Nobody answered.

"New students!" said the Fat Friar, smiling around at them. "About to be Sorted, I suppose?"

She, at least, nodded, feeling obliged to answer a ghost. Who knew, maybe it was rude or something with ghosts and they would get angry if you didn't. But she couldn't bring herself to speak in the dead quiet.

"Hope to see you in Hufflepuff!" said the Friar. "My old house, you know."

There was a sharp noise as the door to the Hall opened again, and Lexi swiveled her head to see McGonagall step in. She didn't look particularly amused at the ghosts. "Move along now," she commanded and several students jumped. "The Sorting Ceremony's about to start."

Professor McGonagall had returned. One by one, the ghosts floated away through the opposite wall.

"Now, form a line," Professor McGonagall told the first years, "and follow me."

It was a minute before they all got situated, and she ended up behind Neville, with a stranger behind her. And then Professor McGonagall led them through the double doors she'd so effortlessly moved- had she even touched them?- which lead to a dining room that looked like it belonged on Olympus.

Thousands of candles hovered in the air, hanging ominously above four long, wide wooden tables, which were mostly filled with students chattering and talking; the source of the noise. Ghosts mingled among them. Lexi thought privately how the candles didn't leak wax on everything and decided, once again, that it was a magic thing and she shouldn't be surprised by magic.

The ceiling was _amazing._ She could think of no other word for the shimmery black starlight. The only reason she knew there was actually a ceiling at all was the fact that the sky outside had been cloudy and overcast, and this one was brilliant, with twinkling constellations and a full moon.

"Wow," Neville said.

"Wow," she agreed, and tore her eyes away to look around again.

The tables were covered in glittering golden plates and thick gold cups like metal wineglasses. At the back- or, she supposed, front of the room- there was another table, set in a T above theirs, where older people in robes- probably the teachers- professors- whatever were sitting. This was where Mrs. McGonagall led them, and Lexi hiked up her robes slightly, hoping nobody would notice but wanting even less to fall on her face while everyone in the Hall was standing.

Without a word, McGonagall- though Lexi hadn't seen her fetch it- put a four-legged stool in front of them, with a pointed wizard's hat sitting on the seat. It was old, dusty and patched, more brown than anything else. It was torn and filthy. But everyone in the hall, not just the first years, stared at it and so she did too, wondering all the while what would happen until suddenly a rip opened up near the rim.

And then when it started to sing, she blinked.

 _"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,_

 _But don't judge on what you see,_

 _I'll eat myself if you can find_

 _A smarter hat than me._

 _You can keep your bowlers black,_

 _Your top hats sleek and tall,_

 _For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

 _And I can cap them all._

 _There's nothing hidden in your head_

 _The Sorting Hat can't see,_

 _So try me on and I will tell you_

 _Where you ought to be._

 _You might belong in Gryffindor,_

 _Where dwell the brave at heart,_

 _Their daring, nerve, and chivalry Set Gryffindors apart;_

 _You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

 _Where they are just and loyal,_

 _Those patient Hufflepuffis are true And unafraid of toil;_

 _Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,_

 _if you've a ready mind,_

 _Where those of wit and learning,_

 _Will always find their kind;_

 _Or perhaps in Slytherin_

 _You'll make your real friends,_

 _Those cunning folk use any means_

 _To achieve their ends._

 _So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

 _And don't get in a flap!_

 _You're in safe hands (though I have none)_

 _For I'm a Thinking Cap!"_

The whole hall burst into applause as the hat finished its song. It bowed to each of the four tables and then became quite still again.

"That's a singing hat," she said in a flat voice.

Despite himself and the look of terror on his face, Neville bit back a giggle. "Yes, it seems so."

Professor McGonagall, once again with an item she hadn't been holding before, stepped forward towards the Hall of students they were facing and lifted a sheet of stiff looking parchment.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said. "Abbott, Hannah!"

A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down. There was a short moment of silence, and Lexi wondered what was going to happen.

"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat.

The table on the right cheered and clapped as Hannah went to sit down at what had to be the Hufflepuff table, adorned in yellow, with badger emblems al around, pinned to the student's cloaks and on woven placemats under their empty plates.

She spent the time watching each table's reactions to each name, and eventually distinguished each of the houses: Gryffindor, in red and gold, Ravenclaw, in black and white, Hufflepuff, in yellow and black, and Slytherin, in silver and green.

Gryffindors were brave, she thought. Ravenclaw were smart, Hufflepuff were loyal and kind, Slytherin were cunning and ambitious. That was what the song had said.

Which house would she go into?

...

"Cendrillon, Lillian." the Professor said, and Lily realized she was being asked to go up on a stage in front of the entire school and put on a hat that would apparently determine the house she was going to eat with, work with, and live with for the next seven years of her life, no take-backs.

What the _fuck_ was she doing with her life?

Going to a Wizard school.

Lily sighed, and then stood, making her way up to the stage with as much confidence as she could muster feeling everyone's eyes on her. And she sat on the little stool, and they put the giant hat on her head, and Lily almost swore when it spoke in her brain.

 _Hmm,_ it mused. _Ambitious, and intelligent. Loyal to a fault, and courageous when you need be. But one stands above the rest... it'll have to be..._

And the thing bellowed, _"SLYTHERIN!"_ at the top of it's nonexistent lungs.

Slytherin cheered, the house with the green and silver and snake emblems, and once they took the hat off she hurried down there and found a seat. Once they stopped, the next name called, she took a minute to observe her new table. They were quiet, she noticed. But calculating- like they were sizing the new kids up, trying to see who was what.

 **...**

Neville was nervous, determined not to show it, and almost certain he was failing.

They were calling names in alphabetical order, so he knew his was coming closer with each passing name. His only consolation was that most of the other students looked pretty queasy, too.

"Charlotte, Caitlyn!"

 _"RAVENCLAW!"_

"What house do you want to be in?" Lexi whispered from beside him; flinched when the hat yelled out, " _GRYFFINDOR!"_

"I'm not sure," he said honestly. "My Gran thinks I'll be sorted into Hufflepuff."

 _"RAVENCLAW!"_

"Hufflepuff. That's the 'Just and loyal' one, right?"

 _"SLYTHERIN!"_

"Yeah. Which one do you-"

"Longbottom, Neville!" the Professor called, and the Hall went silent again. Neville froze.

 **...**

Neville had gone to Gryffindor. Lexi couldn't really say she was surprised, really, she didn't have the right, since she didn't know anything about the houses other than what the Sorting Hat had sung about, but still. "Brave of heart" and "daring, nerve, and chivalry" weren't the first words she'd use to describe Neville Longbottom. She'd be just as surprised if _she_ made it into Gryffindor.

The hat didn't even want to go on one boy's head, yelling "SLYTHERIN!" before it even cleared the rim, and that kid looked horribly proud of it. She wasn't quite sure of the "using any means to achieve their ends" part either. Honestly, she agreed with Neville; she was probably going to be put in Hufflepuff. At least she had patience.

She was lost in thought for a while, imagining what it would be like to be in each house, nervously awaiting her time on the bench, when suddenly the whole room went dead quiet. No whispers, no titters, nothing. Lexi looked up automatically, because whenever that happened in class before it'd meant she'd been caught spacing out and everyone was staring.

Well, everyone was staring, all right, but not at her: at the boy making his way up to the platform where the hat waited.

"That's Harry Potter," one of the first years whispered nearby, and the other nodded emphatically.

Lexi didn't know who "Harry Potter" was, but he was up there for a long, long while, much longer than any of the other kids. Even she now was watching, wondering why everyone was so intent on this one first year's Sorting, and jumped when the hat finally drew in a breath and yelled out, _"GRYFFINDOR!"_

The Great Hall dissolved into chaos, each House freaking out in it's own way, although Gryffindors were certainly the loudest. She resisted the urge to cover her ears, wondering what was even _going on,_ why was _everyone panicking,_ but eventually the teachers- professors- managed to get everyone back under control enough that they could hear the next couple names be called, and eventually he hype died down.

She paid attention for a few people more, especially when, as one boy's name was called, a voice yelped, _"Sam?!"_ in the quiet all the way from the Slytherin table. The boy in question, Samuel, looked over in that general direction, and then his face split into a grin as he sat and he pointed, yelled "Ey!" back at whoever it was.

Barely half a second before the hat yelled, _"GRYFFINDOR!"_

Nothing quite so interesting happened after that and, eventually bored, she stared at the talking hat as it bobbed about and tried not to think about to being her turn eventually to be Sorted. This all still felt like a dream, but that didn't change her crippling stage fright in the slightest...

"Talbot, Alexandria!"

... Oh.

Carefully, she stood, paying careful attention to her feet and where they were stepping, and made her way up to the stage. Funny, it hadn't seemed so quiet in here before... the stool looked kind of flimsy up close, too small, and she felt like a young child sitting down on it, and that feeling only got worse when the hat actually dropped down over her eyes. Of course it'd done that to most of the other kids, too, but...

 _Well._

Lexi flinched.

 _How interesting._

She thought, _what's interesting?_ and flinched again when it actually answered.

 _Humble. Loyal. Kind. Patient._

 _Hufflepuff?_ she thought.

 _No, no. Smart. Sly. You do know your way around a lie, don't you? Hmm, yes. You'll save your friends, but you'll save yourself. Lonely. No- alone._

Uncomfortable, Lexi shifted. She was well-aware the hat had already taken longer than usual. It was sifting through her thoughts, though; that cut through her embarrassment. It was going through her mind, through her memories, she could feel it in the way she remembered odd moments of deceit, of lying little white lies to her parents, that she'd remembered to turn in a book or paper that she'd forgotten about and could turn in the next day, about walking the dog after she'd forgotten, about sitting alone at the lunch table, sleepovers with one, two friends... Being bullied, being praised.

 _So what?_ she thought at last.

 _You would make a very good Hufflepuff,_ it said, _but there are good hearts in Slytherin, too._

 _"SLYTHERIN!"_

If she could be any more speechless, Lexi probably would have swallowed her tongue.

The Professor pulled the hat off, and immediately the memories seeped away. Now she could see the whole of the Great Hall staring at her, the Slytherins having burst into raucous applause, but she could pick out Neville's face, Hermoine's face in Gryffindor, and saw the shock on their faces.

Somehow she managed to stand, knees wobbly, just kind of relieved to be going to sit at a table and disappear, but still. _What?_ As she sat on the edge of the table, an older boy grinned at her with a lopsided smirk.

"Welcome to Slytherin," he said conspiratorially. "Best House in Hogwarts!"

"Um, y-yeah," she stammered.

An older man in at the teacher's table stood, and the Hall quieted somewhat as he held out his arms in a jovial way. "Albus Dumbledore," she heard one of the students mutter, probably to a first year.

"Welcome," the man said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!"

 **...**

She was taking this in stride, this appearance of food from thin air. But, really, that was mostly because of the lamb chops.

"Does this mean the dishes do themselves?" she asked distractedly whilst piling her plate with several meats. It all looked amazing, and it all hadn't been there two seconds prior. Lily wondered if it would clean up this easily, and if she could learn to make food appear on a regular basis.

But there wasn't an answer. She'd been welcomed into the crowd happily enough- although it seemed more like these students were trying to make allies than friends- but soon enough the word had spread like wildfire from the focal point that was Draco Malfoy, and suddenly it was like she was poisonous to look at, save for self-righteous glances and glares over noses.

It seemed like school was the same whether she was magic or not.

So she ate in silence for the rest of the meal, completely ignoring the other Slytherins like they were ignoring her, listening to their conversations, and the general noisy chatter of the entire hall. Anything she said went completely ignored, or scoffed at.

Eventually it was just too ridiculous, Sam was at the Gryffindor table, and all her food was gone. Ignoring the way her food scraps vanished off her plate as she stood, Lily huffed, straightened her robes, and stalked away toward the red-and-gold covered table with the bursting laughter, also ignoring the looks she could feel on her back, the comments she couldn't hear just out of earshot.

Sam's curly blond head was easy enough to spot, and so she stepped in that direction, walking briskly between the tables until she was hovering just behind him. H didn't notice at first, engrossed in a conversation about rum and smoke and tea with the boy beside him, but he definitely noticed when she wrapped her arm around his throat in what she hoped was a familiar enough gesture.

"Guess who!" she exclaimed gleefully when he jerked, grinning widely.

"Damn, I hope it's my favorite redhead in the woorld!" he sang without turning around, and waved his fork a little.

"Hey, Blondie, move over a bit," she ordered the boy with the charred goblet and singed eyebrows and let go of Sam. "I wanna sit next to my friend."

Apparently too stunned to argue, he did, and she sat down, feeling vastly more comfortable than she had at her House table. Sam grinned easily. His plate was still half-filled with a mangled-looking lava cake and a few pretzels, and offhandedly Lily realized that the contents of the plates on the tables had changed to desserts. "Soo, how've you been? Y'know, besides getting sorted into Slytherin? ... You have fun with that."

"Eh. Honestly it's not any different than regular school." She waved a hand dismissively and grinned wickedly. "They'll soon learn their place."

"See, this is why I love you. You don't take people's shit." Like her, despite his young age, Sam had a sailor's mouth, and used it well. This was why they got along so well. They were cut from the same kind of cloth. Only, making two _very_ different garments...

"Oh, and before I forget," Lily said, and took a deep breath. Sam, suddenly looking suspicious, leaned away slightly. "I _knew_ there was something up from the _start,_ I _knew_ it wasn't just luck. Because _nobody_ can survive a firecracker to the face!"

"To be fair, a firecracker to the face _would've_ killed me," he said reasonably. "I just, moved out of the way. Very quickly."

"Bull _shit._ You used some fucking _magic_ shit!"

"Well, well, well," a voice cut before he could reply, and glancing over, Lily saw a pair of grinning identical ginger twins, older than her at least a year or more, freckled and wearing equally identical robes.

"It seems like a little snake has slithered into the lion's den," the other added, but strangely it felt like a continuation of the first twin's comment.

"Well, this snake doesn't mean any harm," she replied quickly. "But press me, and I _will_ bite."

"Take her word for it," Sam replied lightly, leaning forwards over his plate. "The last time I saw her mad, she beat a kid over the head with a water bottle and got him kicked off our table. That was at my muggle school, by the way."

"Sounds fantastic," replied one kid.

"It was," she said back proudly, but was distracted when she noticed the quickly disappearing carrot cake on the table. While she grabbed a slice, the others continued talking like she hadn't interrupted in the first place.

It seemed like lifetimes passed while they ate and caught up, but eventually, the last of the plates were cleared, the last of the food eaten. Almost instantaneously, the Headmaster Albus Dumbledore stood once again.

"Ahern - just a few more words now that we are all fed and watered. I have a few start-of-term notices to give you. First years should note that the forest on the grounds is forbidden to all pupils. And a few of our older students would do well to remember that as well." There was a knowing pause.

"I have also been asked by Mr. Filch, the caretaker, to remind you all that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors. Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of the term. Anyone interested in playing for their house teams should contact Madam Hooch. And finally, I must tell you that this year, the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a very painful death."

"Is- is he for real?" she asked uncertainly.

Sam shrugged. "Probably."

"Are- are we sure he's a Professor? Because this is the same guy who broke into my hospital room."

"Why were you in the hospital?"

"I was in a coma after blowing up the school."

"That was _you?"_ Sam exclaimed delightedly. "Everyone thought that was like some Dark Wizard terrorism! What did they _do?"_

It said a lot that he automatically assumed- correctly- that she'd blown up the school because of a _them._ "They cut my hair, and then I don't remember. They cut my hair, I cut their lives."

"... Wait, did you kill someone?"

"... Um... that's a good question..." Lily frowned. "Maybe that's why I'm in Scotland..."

"Lily, what the _fuck,"_ Sam groaned, but still he was smiling. A few Gryffindors on either side of them looked nervous, she noticed now as she finished off her carrot cake.

"And now, before we go to bed, let us sing the school song!" Dumbledore cried suddenly, and flicked his wand. A long, golden ribbon spat out of it, rising above the tables and twisting like so many snakes, and Lily realized they were forming words, craning her neck to see. "Everyone pick their favorite tune," Dumbledore finished, "and off we go!"

And the school bellowed:

 _"Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,_

 _Teach us something please,_

 _Whether we be old and bald_

 _Or young with scabby knees,_

 _Our heads could do with filling_

 _With some interesting stuff,_

 _For now they're bare and full of air,_

 _Dead flies and bits of fluff,_

 _So teach us things worth knowing,_

 _Bring back what we've forgot,_

 _just do your best, we'll do the rest,_

 _And learn until our brains all rot."_

Everybody finished the song at different times, with different beats, Lily one of the first ones done, done to her own beat once she realized what was going on. Eventually there were only the two red-headed twins farther down the Gryffindor table, singing the last few lines to a funeral march, and when they finished, Dumbledore clapped with the rest of the Hall, Lily joining in, too.

"Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here! And now, bedtime. Off you trot!"

The Slytherin first years, which Lily had to hurry to catch up to, followed a boy with a badge who seemed to know what he was doing- people with badges tended to know what they were doing, in Lily's experience, at least usually- and they marched downstairs, winding through a few long corridors, under archways and through large rooms that looked suspiciously like dungeons, until they reached one wall in particular.

"Right then," the boy said. "This here's the entrance to the Slytherin common room. You'll need a password to get in; that changes every fortnight. Right now the password is 'Ouroboris,' so don't forget it, or you'll be trapped waiting for your friends."

As he said "Ouroboris" the wall shifted and rumbled, dropping a bit of dust as a doorway opened in the middle of the wall, like it'd been left there all summer without being opened and only now was it being disturbed. He gestured impatiently with one hand. "Well, get a move on. Your bunks'll have your names on the doors. You can figure out who sleeps where."

It was just as cold inside the "common rooms" as it was in the dungeons; chilly. It was a little dark, so in the time it took for Lily's eyes to adjust, most of the first years had made it inside and spread about to get a better look at the place. No matter how much her eyes adjusted, it was still a little dim. It still looked like a dungeon- a more ornate dungeon, but a dungeon- with snake emblems carved and decorating the stone walls and floor. There was a fireplace flanked by windows, he flue covered in snake skulls.

The furniture was something she would expect from an abandoned aristocrat's house, heavy-looking an old, with a few tables, chairs, and rugs scattered throughout the room, along with two or three fancy chess sets and candlesticks.

Aside from those, the only lights seemed to be coming from the floating green orbs scattered around the room and the large glass windows, which seemed to ripple with green, and Lily thought it was some kind of magical effect- like the ceiling of the Great Hall, until the boy with the badge they'd been following added from behind after the dungeon door closed, "The Slytherin rooms're under the Black Lake- the one you'd have crossed getting here. Sometimes you can see the Giant Squid or the mermaids."

Lily froze in her tracks, eyes darting to the window, and thought she saw something dark flicker past.

 _I've made a terrible mistake,_ she thought, with no small amount of horror. _I should've gone Gryffindor._

...

It was too much and too little at the same time, or maybe just too awkward. But no more than a half hour after being brought to the dorms, Lexi couldn't deal with the chattering and party-like atmosphere that was nice and probably really welcoming to the other kids except she was sitting off in a corner absently moving chess pieces on a set because apparently they were voice-activated, and wanting to read a book or something and not sit there like a self-conscious loser when _no one was even talking to her._

So eventually she scooted off to the girls dormitories, which were made up of several rooms, a lot of which had names pinned to the doors for new first years. It took a minute to find her own, too nervous to let anyone see her failing at finding her own name on a door so leaning against the wall like she was doing something on purpose whenever another Slytherin went by, but eventually she did.

The most numbers on any door were four, so she was assuming there were either four beds or two bunkbeds or something to a room, but theirs only had three names: Pansy Parkinson, Lillian Cendrillon, and Alexandria Talbot. It must have been the overflow. She _was_ curious about how they had managed to sort them into rooms only hours after being sorted, though.

Either way, once she opened the door, she knew she would like it there.

It was dark, done in the same stone detailing as everywhere else in the dorm, with the same softly glowing green spheres and a large glass window with black lines tracing out the Slytherin emblem. Wavy dark green light drifted in through the window, shifting with the water, and as she walked up to it, she realized that even though it was night, she could see the shadowy outlines of sea life.

Turning, Lexi took in the bunk-beds, tall and somehow regal for a bunk-bed, with silver bed frames and a deep shade of green that reminded her of forests in North Carolina. Green drapes of curtain were tied on each post, even the top beds, which were al four-poster. And it all looked rather shimmery and soft, like it was made with silk, but the blankets looked thick and the pillows soft.

There was a single chair just a little from the door, a big plush looking thing like the others in the common room, and a soft white-silver shag carpet that didn't quite reach the last three or four inches to each wall.

Their luggage was piled in the middle of the room, so hurriedly she picked out her trunk and suitcase and terrarium. The trunk had her school supplies and other knickknacks that fit, like reading books and shoes and decorations. The suitcase had her muggle clothes, a pillow and a light blanket both for the plane ride to England and in case it was cold here, her stuffed bear, a few other books, and a few more odds and ends that she couldn't recall.

She would have to get a stand or table for her terrarium, Lexi realized as she pulled it away from someone's cat, who she stopped to coo at. It was as big as a ten gallon fish tank, with brown dirt on the bottom, a few mossy rocks and sticks, a small plant like a tiny tree she didn't recognize that she'd bought from Magical Menagerie, and a small puddle like pond in one corner. There were already food dishes inside. Iris croaked at her as she moved the tank.

Quickly, in case anyone else came in and not up for trying to explain which bunk she wanted, Lexi moved all her luggage onto the bottom bunk on the right side of the room, closest to the window, the one bunk that got direct light from the Black Lake, which was actually pretty green for a Black Lake.

She also took Iris out of her tank and settled her on the bed, since the woman at the store had promised she was well-behaved and trained not to go hopping off away from their owner. Finally, after pushing her trunk to the foot of the bed and shoving her suitcase to the end of it, she went to her trunk to pull out the book she'd been planning on reading.

And paused.

The stuff was gone from it. The textbooks, reading books, cloaks, scales and vials and other things were gone, but that wasn't the alarming part. No, the weird part was that it had bottomed out- by which she meant there wasn't a bottom to her trunk, only a rung of a stepladder that stuck out of the wall of her trunk a foot below where her trunk stopped existing, and it lead down, down, down, impossibly, to what looked like a cellar or basement, all wooden like her trunk.

And, at the bottom, lit with a few candles and glowing torches on the walls, sat another first year boy dressed in his robes but no hat, wand out and swinging experimentally.

She didn't scream, nor did she gasp. Lexi just stared, blinked once, and took a deep breath, reaching up a hand to brush off the pointed hat she wore. _Magic,_ she told herself sternly. _Don't be surprised by magic. This is probably normal._

It still took a second before she could bring herself to speak. "U-um... excuse me... where are my things?"

The boy with blond hair startled, head whipping up from where he sat criss-crossed barely in her line of sight, and gaped at her. "Oops!" he yelped. "It was only supposed to affect _my_ trunk! Hi, by the way, I'm Sam!"

"Um, hi." Okay, now she saw her stuff, it was a pile on the ground at the bottom of the stairs. She hoped desperately that the scales and glass vials weren't broken. "Did you use a spell?" she asked hesitantly. "Is it permanent?"

The door opened suddenly just as she finished the words and Lexi flinched, a hot tremor shooting through her body, and turned to see who it was. She recognized this girl- either Lillian or Pansy- she was the one from the train she'd seen for a split second before moving on while looking for Trevor.

"... Is what permanent?" the girl asked quizzically. "Maybe I can fix it."

The heat from adrenaline turned into heat from embarrassment that traveled across her face and neck as she realized her roommate thought she was talking to a trunk. "No, no," she said quickly. "Um- I- there's a-"

"Something wrong?" Sam called from below. "Who's there? Please don't let it be a Professor-"

"Wait..." The girl narrowed her eyes. "I know that voice. _Sam?"_

"Lily! We meet again!"

The redheaded girl- Lily, it must have been Lillian- threw her cloak down on the other bottom bunk and rushed over to stare down into the trunk over Lexi's shoulder and gasped. "What are you doing in a _trunk?_ Wait. What are you doing in my _dorm?"_

"I'm not sure, actually," he replied with an easy shrug and a grin, looking not at all sheepish. "Oh! I should probably introduce you two. Random girl whose trunk I accidentally spelled, Lily. Lily, random girl whose trunk I accidentally spelled."

 _I would think that's obvious at this point,_ she thought, but only fidgeted where she sat on the floor and raised her hand halfway in what was almost a wave, the sleeve of her robe dropping to her elbow. "Hi."

"Hey, I know you," Lily said suddenly, gaze snapping to hers. Her eyes were dark, but she couldn't tell what shade. "You're the girl from the train! You were looking for a toad! Did you find it? Are you American?"

Lexi shrank slightly from the onslaught of questions, still knelt on the floor in front of the trunk. "Um, yeah," she said quietly. "Actually, Hagrid found Neville's toad... yeah, are- are you?"

Before she could answer- it was a rhetorical question anyway, of course Lily was American, she was the only person aside from Sam that she'd met thus far without a british accent- the doorknob turned, not quite as suddenly as it had when Lily opened it.

At the noise, Lily started, and slammed the top down on her trunk. A faint, "Hey, where'd you go?" echoed up, but Lily banged the top and it went quiet just as what could only have been Pansy- Lexi forgot her last name- opened the door with an audible huff. "I can't believe that I managed to get the _only_ room with only _mudbloods,"_ she sniffed, more to herself than them.

Lexi frowned slightly, mouthing 'mudblood' to herself under her breath, knowing it was probably an insult but not getting what it meant. But she just stood and took a step away from her trunk.

"Hello to you too," Lily said amicably. "And what are you some kind of pug transfiguration gone wrong?"

"Hmph! I don't have to listen to trash like you. Now get off my bed, _I'm_ getting a bottom bed."

"That's my stuff, and I'll kill you," Lily retorted blandly, and Pansy flinched where she'd been picking up her trunk. "Okay, lets get one thing straight. It's obvious we don't like each other, but I'm willing to make a compromise. I won't touch your stuff, I won't bug you, and in turn, you do the same. We're stuck with each other for at least this year, and if you bug me, I'll be sure that you regret it."

Lexi said nothing, almost hoping she wouldn't be seen, going again for her bed. Never mind. She'd get hr book in the morning. Somehow.

"Besides, we've already touched the beds," Lily continued with a deprecating smile, waggling her fingers in pantomime. "Wouldn't want to get some _muggle disease,_ would you?"

Pansy Parkinson took the bed above Lexi's, to say the least.

Later that night, they compared timetables and realized they were exactly the same. Potions, Transfiguration, Charms, Lunch period, free period, History of Magic and Herbology on Monday, History of Magic, free period, double Herbology with Hufflepuff, lunch, Defense against the Dark Arts, two free periods and then Astronomy at midnight on Tuesday, Potions, Transfiguration, Double charms with Ravenclaw, lunch, free period, Defense against the Dark Arts and Herbology on Wednesday, History of Magic, two free periods, lunch, Defense against the Dark Arts, Herbology and Flying class on Thursday, and Double Potions with Gryffindor, Transfiguration, lunch, Charms, and the rest of the day off on Fridays.

Lexi was curious and excited for all of the classes, but particularly for a few, like Defense against the Dark Arts and Potions, and _especially_ for flying classes. When Lily didn't know what that meant, she'd asked around a little until someone finally told them it was broomstick practice, which didn't dampen her excitement at all. _Flying?_ She couldn't _wait_ for Thursday.

It was a weird schedule, and she wasn't used to having more than one class. Back at her elementary school, it had been the same class every day, with the subject always taught in the same order throughout. This was... going to be difficult.

...

This was going about as well as she'd expected it to, but that didn't make her any less flustered as she hurried up and down the hallways, running now that there wasn't anyone about now that classes had started up, schedule in hand.

Why was this castle so _big?_ Why did everything look exactly the _same?_ Oh, God, oh, God, she thought as she scrabbled about, glancing at room numbers and down dark hallways and through archways, I'm so late, I'm so late, I'm _so late._

She had no idea what time it was, but it was definitely past nine fifteen, which was when her Potions class had started. She'd woken up early to go and look for it and missed breakfast and _still couldn't find it._ This wasn't how she'd wanted to start today. It was supposed to be different here.

Being magical apparently didn't make her sense of direction any better...

Suddenly she heard a shout and skidded to a stop, robes and hat askew. "... course, this would only happen to me!"

 _Lily._ She'd still been sleeping when Lexi left. She followed the angry bellowing down two hallways until it all opened back up to the staircases she'd climbed before realizing Potions was in the dungeons, which _apparently_ was right next to her dorms. Her teacher was going to hate her...

Looking up, she saw a staircase stopped oddly in the middle of the floors, the bottom not connecting to any platforms. She couldn't see Lily from this vantage point, but if she was on that stair- which she was- then she couldn't get down any more than she could find the classroom.

She cupped her hands around her mouth. "Lily!" she called, voice despite trying to get her roommate's attention a harsh whisper out of habit. "Are you okay?"

"No! The stairs broke!" came her angry wail.

"What do you _mean_ the stairs broke? They're magic!"

"I mean they broke! I've been stuck here for like twenty minutes! Go get a Professor!"

"But I'm lost!"

There was another long-suffering wail from the stairs. It echoed through the stone halls. "Lexi, I'm about this close to trying to make the jump and I _know I can't make that jump."_

"I _say._ What _is_ all this noise?" a bored, irritated voice came from behind, and maybe it was the dungeons but she jumped and whirled around fast enough to trip on her robes, and banged her shoulder into a wall catching herself, yelping. "Owww..."

And then she straightened like a lightning shot. It was the ghost from the Slytherin tables, with the bloodstained silver robes and permanent scowl. They hadn't yet spoken, but he seemed maudlin and constantly annoyed. Heart pounding in her throat, Lexi couldn't quite make herself say anything.

"Bloody Baron!" Lily yelled. "Can you please get a professor, I've been stuck here for twenty minutes!"

Finally the breath left her throat, and Lexi muttered, "I can't find Mr. Snape's classroom."

The Bloody Baron huffed in exasperation, then turned and started to float away in what Lexi hoped was the way to Professor Severus Snape's Potions room. She called up to Lily that she would come back soon with a teacher and bounded after the ghost, textbooks clutched to her chest.

It wasn't like he could get her any more lost.

...

The rest of the day went smoothly enough, despite the embarrassing spew of stutters as she'd attempted to explain to Professor Snape that she'd gotten lost from the dorms literally two turns away from Slytherin dorms and that Lily was stuck on the charmed stairs that had apparently stopped, and she'd been docked five points from Slytherin and glared at the rest of the all-Slytherin class.

She stuck with Lily like glue, and between the two of them they managed not to be any later than ten minutes to any given class, an event that most of the teachers were sympathetic to because muggle-borns and purebloods alike had troubles for the first month or so.

Transfiguration was as interesting as she'd thought it would be, and for the first time she'd taken diligent notes before they started. Professor McGonagall had turned the desk into a pig and back like it was nothing, but, she realized on their first tries, turning things into other things wasn't as easy as saying the spell correctly.

They were supposed to be turning matches into needles. She'd gotten hers to turn silver by the end of the second class, but that was it. Mrs. McGonagall had still seemed pleased, though.

Charms class was just... fun. Trying out a new spell every day, and once the directions were given- how to move your wand, how to speak the spell- she could actually perform most of them, because unlike Transfigurations, where the warm rush needed to be contained and shaped, in Charms a lot of spells just needed a proper _outlet_ to be released and that was it.

Lily seemed to be pretty good at it too- they were the only two to consistently be capable of performing spells after one or two classes' worth of practice, give or take a few spells and Lily blowing things up sometimes, a common occurrence in all of their classes, not just Charms.

History of Magic was interesting- in the way that maybe reading the textbook was interesting because there were really cool stories in it, but _Professor Binns was the dullest anything on the face of the planet._ Even the fact that he was a ghost couldn't catch her interest. She spent most of the class reading, and took notes on her own time at the library or from her textbook during free time.

Herbology was fun as well, interesting and stimulating, one of her favorite classes. They were hands-on with plants that walked and screamed or did nothing at all but have various magical and medical properties, and she learned how to care for them and what they did. This as a class sometimes shared with Gryffindors, so she got to hang out with Sam and Neville as well, even if Neville was scared of a few plants.

Defense against the Dark Arts was all that she'd ever expected a wizard school class to be like. Filled with supplies more varied and interesting than the gross pickled things in the Potions room, with demonstrations of various creatures as well as spells on how to ward them. The textbook for that class was by far the most interesting and ominous of all of them. But she loved the class and was decent at it, even doing well on the essays and tests, not just the spells.

Astronomy was cool, but _hard._ Back at home, her bedtime had always been eight thirty, no exceptions, and now she had to stay up until midnight and then get through an entire class and take notes once a week. If she could've fallen asleep on her telescope, she would've, but the tables were to small to do anything but give your papers a backing to write on.

Lunch was spent together, time during which Lexi realized she and Lily had a lot of interests in common and could babble on for hours. And Lily didn't mind it when she was too shy to speak, or only wanted to read instead of talk. Quickly, they became partners in everything: in Potions, in Herbology, in any group project. Dinner was the same, but with dessert, and sometimes they hopped over to Gryffindor table when the older year slytherins got too much to bear.

Flying classes didn't start for another week, so there was that to look forward to.

A few classes in particular were the most memorable, like when Neville was put to sleep by mandrakes or the time during Double-Potions with Gryffindor when Mr. Snape completely tried to destroy that poor boy Harry Potter and docked two points from him by the time it was all over, and she and Draco at least won back all the points Lily lost Slytherin by coming in late and answering a question about Wolfsbane the teacher had been trying to use to humiliate Harry by making passing potions the first attempt. And between the two of them- her in particular, but they both had them- they had enough fantastical getting-lost stories to ease some of the tension in Slytherin and Gryffindor house alike at their presence.

On the weekends and free periods, they hung out, sometimes working on homework assignments and sometimes not, a lot of times convening in Lexi and Sam's trunk when Pansy wasn't around, trying to figure out how to put furniture in it from the common rooms without anyone noticing and recreate Sam's wild spell to include Lily's trunk as well.

At night she read or just passed out, and just as she did at her old school she found herself drifting into the same habits despite her various promises to herself, staying just as disorganized and messy as she had always been, and frustrating some of the teachers despite being among the better students in all her classes.

And everything was better, because her father was a continent away and still trying to figure out how to use owls. It was freer, nobody pointing out her mistakes every day of the week, nobody to get angry if she did her History of Magic essay on Uric the Oddball two days before it was due instead of five. Lily was exhilarating, all energy and reckless abandon and sarcastic cursing; Sam a rush of spastic movement and words and sounds.

The got odd looks, Slytherins and a Gryffindor, but Lexi was learning to ignore it.

 **...**

She'd gone to sleep to the gentle swishing of the Black Lake, after seeing the eye of the giant squid for the first time. It was a weekend, a Saturday, so there were no classes to worry about, and aside from a spell she needed to be able to use by Tuesday, nothing to work on.

And now she was waking up rather violently to the frantic urging of Lily to "get up and eat, and go, because the early bird caches the worm and I sewed Pansy Parkinson's nightgown to the bed while she was sleeping so let's go get breakfast before she wakes up!" and being dragged out of the dorm room.

And somewhere between classes, hallways, dungeons, wands, textbooks, angry Housemates, and giant grounds, Lexi found herself a home.

 **...**

 **...**

 **..**

 **.**

 **HEY GUYS IT'S ME! I'M PROCRASTINATING!**

 **So I dunno how many of you ever went to Lily's "We are not ninjas" but NEMCET is much the same thing: our headcanons about being in the Naruto verse. I write everything, therefore this is on my account, however I'm usually sitting with Lily as I do so, so a lot of the things she says and does are her own.**

 **Sam is another one of our friends, but he's not coordinating, so hopefully we pin this correctly...**

 **OMG I WAS SUCH A SHY ELEVEN YEAR OLD. Holy shiet. I had no self confidence at all. And Lily cursed like a sailor.**

 **We WILL finish this, as this is my story rather than hers, and I can write more and faster than her. Anyway! All questions will be happily answered! This will span all seven books but hopefully be no more than thirty chapters or so! More characters will be introduced! We will provide answers for being in a british school eventually!**

 **I will finish FOW's next chapter!**

 **Ciao! Review!**


	2. Chapter 2

Breakfast started at seven thirty and lasted until nine, but they hadn't actually made it until a little past eight, because Lily was hard to wake up and Lexi too nervous to go to breakfast alone. She didn't yet feel comfortable amongst the other Slytherins despite the emblem brooch she'd been given by the Head Girl to pin to her cloaks.

Not that she really needed to be. After the first week, Lexi had gathered up the courage to follow behind her friend as she stalked off to the Gryffindor's table to eat with Sam and the Weasely twins, who she almost never guessed the names of correctly. They didn't do it _every_ morning, but some days there were Draco Malfoy or Crabbe or Goyle or Pansy or someone being mean and nasty and Lily would leave and Lexi would follow.

It looked like it was shaping up to be one of those days.

"I don't _care_ if Purebloods would be better logically at _doing_ spells, halfbloods and muggle-borns have more perspectives in both science _and_ magic, even aside from being able to actually _fight_ they're probably better at _making_ spells and improvising at the very least-"

"As if a bloody half-blood or a mudblood could do _any_ kind of magic even a _fraction_ as well as a Pureblood! Not _only_ is it in our blood, we've been learning it since practically our birth!"

"- and potions, for that matter-" Lily continued.

"Half-bloods would be learning magic just as long as purebloods," Lexi contributed barely above a mutter around her eggs. "You know, since at least one of their parents is a witch or wizard, right?"

Lily opened her mouth, probably to agree, but Draco beat her to it. "Nobody asked _your_ opinion, Mudblood," he sneered, and Lexi frowned thoughtfully. She'd been called that a few times and still had no idea what that meant. But she didn't ask, face starting to warm, eyes darting back to her plate at his tone.

Crabbe or maybe Goyle snickered. Then there was silence for a second, maybe Draco waiting for Lily to continue the argument. But then there was an odd noise underneath the chatter and clamor of the cafeteria- she could hear the twins from her spot at the Slytherin table- a kind of spitting noise, like the cauldrons in Potions when they boiled.

Then suddenly there was a _pop!_ little splashing noises, and Draco was spluttering. Lexi glanced up, now poking at her hash browns, and blinked at the sight that was Draco Malfoy spitting what looked like orange juice out of his mouth and wiping it off his face, a few black splatters darkening on the sleeves of his robes. She dropped her fork. Crabbe, Goyle, and a good number other Slytherins gawped at him in surprise.

His goblet, undamaged, had a curl of steam or smoke wafting out the rim. Lily had murder spelled out on her face, steeped into her voice when she spoke, and Lexi realized that'd been her magic, unintentional as her wand was still tucked away somewhere hidden. "You're _damn_ lucky I don't wanna get expelled right now," she said in a voice that sounded like screaming without being horribly loud.

Then she glanced over at her, and Lexi straightened at the jerk of her chin: _Let's go._ She picked up her plate and goblet, scrabbling to get off the seat without tripping over her robes, and followed as Lily stormed towards the Gryffindor table.

"It's okay," she tried along the way. "Whatever he called me, I mean, it's fine, I don't really care that much-"

"Honestly, he could've called you way worse," she muttered darkly. "But it's the fact he called you _anything_ horrid. You're _my_ friend."

Not sure what to say to respond to that, she just moved her fork so it wouldn't fall off her plate, and sat next to Lily as she sat next to Sam, ending up with Neville at her left, to Lexi's relief. Not a stranger, nor one of the Gryffindors who hated her on principle of being a Slytherin.

"Hi," she said, picking again at her food as he blinked at her in surprise.

"Hullo," he greeted.

"Look like you're plotting murder," Sam observed a few seats away as Lily took her place.

"Thinking about it."

"Typical," another boy was saying, Harry Potter from the Sorting- she remembered his black hair and big glasses, the way everyone had whispered and gawked. "Just what I always wanted. To make a fool of myself on a broomstick in front of Malfoy."

 _Broomstick._ Right, right. Lexi smiled to herself happily. Today Flying lessons started, something he'd been looking forward to even more than her usual classes.

"You don't know that you'll make a fool of yourself," the boy beside her said encouragingly. "Anyway, I know Malfoy's always going on about how good he is at Quidditch, but I bet that's all talk."

She _had_ heard Draco a lot in the Common Rooms telling crazy stories about flying on brooms, fantastical stories that sounded false but for all Lexi knew were true, magic, anything was possible with magic.

"Malfoy's a tool," Lily snapped. "Just let me know if he gives you shit, I'll beat the crap out of him."

"Um." Harry looked startled at her interruption. "... Thanks."

They chatted a little more, Lexi mostly staying out of it but talking a little with Neville, who didn't seem to really want in the slightest to talk about flying class in any way, shape or form. Eventually it devolved into Hermione listing off facts and beginner's tips on flying on a broomstick, things about tipping your broom and kicking your feet and holding your shoulders a certain way.

But eventually the mail came, a feat Lexi was certain she would never get used to. Sam and Fred Weasely- George?- laughed at her intent focus as the hundreds of owls came pouring through the windows, smelling of barns and magic burnout, shrieking like banshees and slamming into things and each other, coming to a scratchy stop on the wood.

She hadn't gotten any mail yet. Probably her parents hadn't figured out owls yet or something. A barn owl dropped a paper-wrapped package for Neville. "From my Gran," he explained as he opened it, carefully but happily untying the twine and tearing away the paper to reveal a small glass sphere sloshing with white smoke, like a miniature crystal ball.

"What is it?" she asked, wanting to hold it but not asking.

"It's a Remembrall!" he exclaimed, holding it up. "Gran knows I forget things - this tells you if there's something you've forgotten to do. Look, you hold it tight like this and if it turns red - oh..." His face fell, because the Remembrall had suddenly glowed scarlet, the smoke flooding with color.

"You've forgotten something..."

"The only trouble is, I can't remember what I've forgotten!"

"That seems kind of useless," Lily interjected with a frown.

"Do you know where Trevor is?" Lexi prompted. "Did you feed him? Your potions book again?"

"No, I've done all that."

He was still puzzling it out, turning the ball this way and that to let the light filter and turn the light wood table darker, when a pale hand shot to snatch it away. Neville, startled, didn't close his fingers quick enough, and was left grasping at nothing. Lexi jumped, straightening from her slouch to find, once again, Draco.

Harry, Lily, and a redheaded boy she didn't remember the name of, but who hated Slytherins on principle and thus didn't particularly like her and Lily jumped to their feet. Before either person could say a word it was like Mrs. McGonagall had appeared from her spot at the front of the cafeteria.

"What's going on?" she demanded, with a tone and tight expression that suggested she knew exactly what was going on.

"Malfoy's got my Remembrall, Professor." Neville said meekly.

Draco scowled and dropped the ball unceremoniously back on the table, where it nearly rolled into the butter plate, but Neville saved it. "Just looking," Draco muttered, and slunk away with Grabbe and Goyle, who Lexi was thinking of more and more as "his goons" like from her books.

And then McGonagall left and everyone was scowling angrily except a flustered Neville.

To distract him, she poked his arm. "Can I hold it?" she inquired, and he blinked again.

"Oh, sure! Yeah!" Going from hand to hand, it briefly switched from red to white, but as soon as he handed it over, it glowed a softer shade of maroon.

Lexi frowned, rolled it in her fingers. "I probably forgot my quill or something," she confessed, and though only a few people cracked into laughter around them, she grinned.

 **...**

The Slytherins had arrived just after three, and had to wait for the Gryffindors to make their way down the giant castle steps. In that time, a professor named Madame Hooch had brought out and situated a few lines of twenty or so broomsticks, old fashioned things with wood handles and twigs tied to the end.

"Well, what are you all waiting for?" Madame Hooch barked as soon as they scrambled into line. "Everyone stand by a broomstick. Come on, hurry up."

Lily situated herself with Sam on her left and Lexi on the right, the two Slytherins at the very edge of a line of Gryffindors. A few people to her left in the line in front of them stood Draco Malfoy, who she could still see bragging quietly under his breath to other Slytherins close by. She glanced down at her broom- it was old, definitely. She was more worried, oddly enough, about getting splinters than falling off midair.

"Stick out your right hand over your broom," called Madam Hooch at the front, "and say 'Up!"'

"UP!" everyone shouted.

Lily yelped something that might've been a curse- she didn't really hear it- when her broom shot up handle first. Automatically she raised her hands up to protect herself, so instead of smacking into her palm like it did for a few other kids, it clapped straight into her face, knocking her back into the grass. Immediately it went rigid, non-sentient once more.

She could hear snickering all around her.

"Are you okay?" Lexi asked her, startled, leaning over. Her broom was still on the grass, but she hadn't seen if it lifted or not.

"I got it," she muttered.

"I think _it_ got _you,"_ Sam snickered from behind his hand, broom held loosely in the other. Chances were he already knew how to fly.

Jumping back up to her feet, holding the broom in both hands, Lily huffed. "Screw you, Sam. I will smack you with this broom."

He probably would have made another crack about the broom smacking her, and opened his mouth like he was going to, but then Lexi, focusing on the second and third tries of the others, said "Up!" and the broom jumped. She didn't catch it, but grinned.

"This is so weird," she said.

Eventually Lily managed to snatch it before it went too high, as did Lexi a few tries later. Once everyone had their brooms in hand, Madame Hooch went up and down the lines, showing them how to sit correctly on the brooms so they wouldn't fall off, and fixing their arms, hands and fingers to be able to control movement the best.

"Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard," Madame Hooch ordered once everyone was situated. A few other kids looked a little green, or like their brooms were monsters about to bite, but most looked excited. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle- three- two-

"Come back, boy!" Madame Hooch yelled, and Lily glanced sideways to see that Neville had shot straight up into the air and wasn't stopping. He didn't look like he had any idea how to get back down or even stop. Lily brought a hand to her mouth to call, "Neville! Tuck in your head!"

 _So you don't break your neck when you fall,_ she thought privately. She wasn't quite sure if tucking his head would do anything or not, but her Karate teacher had said the same thing for falling- maybe it was different if you fell from thirty feet instead of jumping out of a car crash, but it was the best idea she had. Because there was no way he was going to make it down on that broom.

"Neville!" Lexi yelped beside her, and then Neville was falling, slipping away from his broom- which continued to float lazily away, immediately stopping it's upwards streak. A few kids screamed as he fell, and then he hit the ground hard almost exactly where he'd taken off. There was a gross dry _snap,_ and Neville gurgled in distress.

Madam Hooch hurried over to his side to see why he was trying to scream. "Broken wrist," she murmured, just loud enough. "Come on, boy- it's all right, up you get." She turned to the rest of the class. "None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'Quidditch.' Come on, dear."

She helped Neville up and slung an arm around his shoulders when he tried to curl around his injured wrist, and together they made their way back up the castle steps. They hadn't even cleared the doors, just far away enough not to hear, when Draco started to laugh, loud and obnoxious and not quite fake.

"Did you see his face, the great lump?" he exclaimed.

She'd seen bullies before, but Malfoy might have been one of the worst, like a villain straight out of a novel, almost _too_ slimy. And she'd fought bullies for _much less_ than this.

"Stop it," Lexi protested, but Draco either didn't hear her or didn't care- probably the former. "Wait, Lily, don't," she said suddenly, voice swerving when she took a step forward. Sam noticed and, with a kind of glinting in his eyes, put a hand on her shoulder.

"There'll be a better time," he said cheerily, but there was a knife-edge beneath his tone. "Where we won't get expelled. Only detention."

"I know you're only trying to stop me," she growled. "But I'll take the bait."

"Yeah. Wasn't joking," he said.

"Shut up, Malfoy," another Gryffindor girl snarled.

"Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom?" Pansy grinned. "Never thought you'd like fat little crybabies, Parvati."

"Look!" said Malfoy, darting forward and snatching something out of the grass. "It's that stupid thing Longbottom's gran sent him."

The Remembrall glittered in the sun as he held it up.

"That's Neville's!" Lexi piped in, and this time Draco heard it, and tossed it into the air to catch again. "Quit it, it's glass!"

"Not like it'll do him much good," he snickered. "Stupid bugger can't remember his own name."

"Give that here, Malfoy," Harry Potter said in a quiet voice that Lily was surprised anyone heard, but immediately all squabbling ceased to focus on him. Lily still flexed her fingers on her broom, contemplating breaking it over his head.

Malfoy smiled nastily. "I think I'll leave it somewhere for Longbottom to find- how about- up a tree?"

"If you put that thing up a tree I'll grab it in two seconds flat," she hissed to herself, glaring at the nearby trees and deeming them capable of climbing. She hadn't meant for Malfoy to hear, but his eyes snapped over immediately.

"The roof, then," he said smugly, and Lily decided it didn't matter if she got expelled, he was going home on hospital leave. But before she could so much as take another step forward, Harry spoke again, this time with a stronger current of anger.

"Give it here!" he yelled, but Draco just kicked up off the ground and was airborne in seconds. Lily noted with a little irritation that he hadn't _just_ been bluffing about his flying. He definitely hadn't outflown any helicopters, but he also seemed to have a little practice. He paused at the treeline.

"Come and get it, Potter!"

Harry grabbed his broom.

"No!" Hermione yelled. "Madam Hooch told us not to move- you'll get us all into trouble."

"No, let him," Lily interrupted. "I doubt they'll actually expel him. And it's not like we had anything to do with it."

"That is not the point!"

Lily ignored her, and kept her eyes on Harry, who seemed like an expert himself at flying a broomstick despite the fact that she was pretty sure she'd heard him mention a muggle family. It seemed like everyone else kept their eyes on Harry, too, and there were a few shouts from both Houses.

Oh, man, she really wanted to fly now. Because it looked amazing, but also because she wanted to help knock Draco off his high broomstick, in a matter of speaking. But it looked like Harry had it covered, swooping up to level with him midair, and she didn't particularly feel like getting expelled or even in trouble for no reason. She was more likely to fall off and make a fool of herself than actually land any kind of blow.

"Give it here," Harry called, just loud enough to be heard from the ground. "or I'll knock you off that broom!"

"Oh, yeah?" Draco taunted.

Harry shot towards Draco on his broom, the latter of whom barely managed to move his out of the way.

"No Crabbe and Goyle up here to save your neck, Malfoy," Harry shouted.

"Catch it if you can, then!" Draco called, and he threw his arm up, Lily knew, to toss the Remembrall into the air, where it would plummet to the ground and smash apart into so much glass dust and white smoke. But Harry tilted his broom and bolted downwards in a nosedive that had several people around her yelping and gasping- he was going to get himself _killed._ But he followed it and followed it until he was only ten or nine feet away from the ground-

"Pull up!" Lexi and a few others shrilled, but he didn't, only reached out and, to Lily's amazement, snatched the glass ball out of the air and swerved his broom so he only rolled across the grass, as easily as if he'd rolled down a hill. He sat up, holding the Remembrall triumphantly just as Draco crashed to a hasty halt where he'd taken off and dropped his broom inconspicuously.

"HARRY POTTER!" a hard voice shrilled, and every student's head whipped to see Professor McGonagall running down the steps into the grass, expression unreadable save for a hard tinge to the set of her eyes. "Never- in all my time at Hogwarts- how dare you- might have broken your neck-"

"It wasn't his fault, Professor-"

"Be quiet, Miss Patil."

"It was Draco Malfoy's fault!" Lily argued, dropping her broom angrily on the ground to raise her hands. McGonagall gave her an odd look, pausing for half a second, and Lily knew her eyes were flashing to the Slytherin brooch pinned to her robes, but she only pursed her lips.

"Really, Harry was only trying to help, Draco stole Neville's-"

"But Malfoy -"

"That's enough, Mr. Weasley, Ms. Cendrillon, Ms. Talbot. Potter, follow me, now."

Harry looked positively despondent; his head hung low as he numbly followed Professor McGonagall towards the castle. Lily looked around her, and caught sight of the smug, triumphant faces of Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, along with a good majority of the other Slytherins. On the other side of the spectrum, most of the Griffindors wore expressions ranging anywhere from piteous to enraged.

The rest of the class was tense, although it _was_ fantastic to fly, even if she was a little wobbly on it. Sam was already good at it, having learned years before Hogwarts how to fly, and merrily sped about on his broomstick, hovering nearby to make idle conversation as she and Lexi figured out their brooms. Lexi wasn't too bad at it either, but refused to go too high up.

It went about the same for the rest of the students, with various levels of success, none quite as good as Harry had been but some definitely pre-practiced, some crash-landing, though not nearly as badly as poor Neville.

"I'm flying," Lexi repeated for what must've been the hundredth time, but she wasn't annoyed, only pounding slightly with adrenaline and majorly with euphoria.

"Yeah!" she replied.

 **…**

After classes, a little tired and mostly not wanting to do her homework since it wasn't due the next day, Lily wasn't exactly pleased to step through the secret dungeon corridor door with Lexi and have the first thing she heard be Malfoy's obnoxious proud voice.

"-probably out there getting kicked out right now, the bloody idiots. Filch'll have their heads for being out after hours, and it's my word against theirs! They'll both probably be expelled!"

Ugly laughter. Lily had surmised that while not _every single_ Slytherin was a douche, most of them were, whether from their personalities or House expectations, she didn't know.

And she thought she knew exactly who Malfoy was talking about, sitting on a plush chair surrounded by first-year housemates like a popular kid, regaling the tales of his bullying like a war story- Harry Potter. It was all he ever talked about.

It was dark as usual, with green light coming in softly through the windows, blacker at night than during the day. She pushed past the usual burst of queasiness at living underwater, where the creatures jeered at her from the other side of the glass and a giant squid and who knew what else loomed, not to mention the possibility of it all just caving in at once.

Lexi sighed, and Lily knew that while she loved the Slytherin common rooms, she liked it better when it was empty. Lexi was shy, not stupid: she could hear as well and knew what she was walking into.

"Who's life are you ruining today?" Lily muttered, purposely loud enough to catch the Slytherins' attention. She said it with a sarcastic lilt, shifting the books in her arms a little. "Oh, wait, let me guess- it's your boy crush, Potter."

It took a second for them to process not just her words but the meaning of them, and several faces turned red rather than just Draco's. "Merlin's pants, no," Draco said with a laugh, just a few seconds too late to sound unaffected. Lily didn't actually believe he had a crush on the other boy, but God, did he get annoying going on and on about how he'd messed up the poor kid's day. "That twat couldn't get a Squib to like _him."_

"You know what they say about kids on the playground," Lexi said softly. Lily had discovered the shy girl was a frequent user of sarcasm, less likely in a situation like this without someone nearby.

"No," Draco said in a smug tone. "What?"

"If you pull on another girl's pigtails, it means you like them."

It took even longer for that to sink in than Lily's boy-crush comment. When it did, his face turned from red to almost purple. Lexi went to pick at her sleeves, eyes on her feet.

"I _don't_ like Potter," he snapped. "I hate him. He's a stupid attention seeker who can't get enough of being famous, even though he's got no skills-"

"Why do you hate him, then?" she sighed, eyes going to the door of the living halls before flicking back to his. "'Cause he wouldn't shake your hand? 'Cause you couldn't be friends with a popular kid?"

Draco opened his mouth, and an angry defensive spheal of angry spilled past his lips, blah blah blah more popular than Potter blah blah blah Pureblood blah blah blah.

"Look, I'm gonna stop you there," she interrupted when he started delving into his family line for whatever reason, putting a hand up for silence. "I have class tomorrow and it's late and I'm bored, and I'm just too tired to deal with you."

And without waiting for his reply, she turned and headed back for the living rooms, Lexi following at her side.

 **…**

Classes passed and days went by without much incident. Lexi was getting good marks and doing well in most of her classes, even if the history class was slightly boring once you got past the fact that it sounded like fairy tales. One, two months passed without much incidence save for scuffles with Slytherin and Gryffindor and other houses alike, scuffles that she often caused simply for standing somewhere but usually only listened to, others that Lily simply either instigated or finished.

She was starting to really relax. She wasn't being bullied nearly as much in this school, and despite how pathetic it sounded, she was far from home, and although her parents had figured out how to Owl, they were few and far between- though her mother sent her more- and her dad didn't know enough about wizard life to be overly criticizing.

If she got a detention, nobody sent word to home- not that she'd gotten a detention, but Sam and Lily had gotten them before and that's how those had gone- there was no online system emailing her parents her grades, and if they had one it wouldn't matter, she was a country away.

She got closer to Sam and Lily and acquainted with a few other kids from different classes, her friends from Gryffindor and a few from Slytherin and Hufflepuff. The teachers liked her well enough, and she was learning to speak more like the kids here, picking up a few british words and sometimes a soft accent.

Even if she constantly got lost and had to be led about by Prefects and ghosts, and occasionally got stranded when a staircase went the wrong way and she didn't know how to get back, she was still living in a castle and she loved it and she loved the common rooms and her dorm despite Pansy.

Iris was doing great as well, happy and occasionally going to classes with her tucked into her robes, nestled happily in little pockets Lily helped her sew in, and she got along with Neville's toad when he brought him to class. She'd finished all her books and was still nervous too check out from the library since she always lost library books, but she probably would eventually.

So pretty soon it was close to Halloween before she knew it, and she was, yes, a little upset about not being able to trick or treat this year, but she was considering asking Professor McGonagall how to transfigure things into pumpkins and figuring out how to make decorations for their dorm.

So currently she was finding herself doodling on the corner of an essay on Death-Cap Mushrooms and their properties, drawing little Jack o' Lanterns and a list of supplies to DIY decorations.

Sam was nowhere to be found, at least not through Lexi's chest, so both her and Lily were studying in their dorm. Lexi lay sprawled on her bed, with Iris sat quietly on her back save for the occasional croak or whine. Lily's cat was somewhere, sometimes here and sometimes there and sometimes not to be seen for hours.

Lily herself was across the room on her bed, feet tapping against the wall, head nearly hanging over the edge. She was holding an open textbook a few inches from her face, eyes skimming across the pages.

The essay was due soon and she knew Professor Snape wouldn't appreciate the doodles, but mushrooms were hard to write more than a paragraph about and she was used to pencils, not un-eraseable quills.

"Hey, do you know anything more about Death-Cap mushrooms? I can't find anything else in this book." She flipped a page absently.

"That's why you can't just use the textbook, Lexi. Just look at some of mine."

"Are you done yet?" she asked curiously, moving slowly to give Iris time to hop off her back and sliding out of bed towards Lily's bag, slumped on the leg of her bed, and rifled through it for her Potions folder.

"Yeah," Lily said. "It was easy."

"It's easy, I just don't have any more facts to write about," she said. "I miss the internet. I'll have to go to the library later or tomorrow or something. It's Friday."

…

On Halloween morning, Lexi had a brief moment of confusion, smelling cooked pumpkin seeds in her dorm room and thinking for a split second that perhaps their carved pumpkins were burning, but then she realized it was probably magic, or the house elves had made so much pumpkin-themed food it was seeping into the dungeons.

It still smelled like mildew and water and brackish tide, but it also smelled like pumpkin candles. Iris was croaking loudly from her tank in protest for food, so reluctantly she opened her eyes.

Pansy was still sleeping above her, so she wasn't anywhere near missing breakfast, but either way she got up to check her bag and feed the toad and start to prod at Lily so by the time breakfast started she'd have already been woken up enough times to actually roll out of bed.

The decorations were a lot more minimal than she was used to. At home, they put up lights and figurines and talking tombstones in the yard, but Pansy was already annoyed with the confetti-like paper chains on the bunk beds and cutout pumpkins and witches and black cats on the walls. Some of the older students had put up actual balls of colored light and talking apparitions with higher level spells she didn't know yet.

Breakfast was fun enough, with festive lights and music from somewhere, even if there were too many pies and pumpkin and cinnamon-based foods for her taste crowding out the regular things, and once again Lexi kind of wished she liked pumpkin and cinnamon and pies.

But there was candy corn and random candies, little marshmallows and appropriately themed decorative foods. Some of the drinks were even colored, even if it didn't change the tastes much. More students were wearing their pointed hats than usual, something she found hilariously ironic, and guessed most of them were muggle-borns. She almost had, but felt too ridiculous in the "school uniform" to wear it considering almost no one else did.

…

In Charms, Professor Flitwick announced that he thought they were ready to start making things fly. Lexi was particularly excited about this, but then she was particularly excited for all things in Charms, or more for the chance to feel the hot magic in her arm and hand and wand and body. There was all sorts of excuses to use magic in Charms.

Flitwick put the class into pairs to practice. Lily ended up being paired with Sam, so Lexi just kind of shuffled to Neville's desk, the only remotely friendly face there aside from maybe Harry or Ron but they were more people she knew than friends.

Neville had brought Trevor along again, but decided to let Lexi hide him in her pockets when kids continuously attempted to make the poor animal shoot up into the air.

"Now, don't forget that nice wrist movement we've been practicing!"

squeaked Professor Flitwick, perched on top of his pile of books. Professor Flitwick was incredibly small. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick. And saying the magic words properly is very important, too- never forget Wizard Baruffio, who said 's' instead of 'f' and found himself on the floor with a

buffalo on his chest."

It was hard, but Lexi didn't particularly mind failing spells in the beginning, since she still got to feel the magic every time she tried. Like her wand was a match and her blood was flammable, even if that wasn't really a good comparison since it wasn't burning, just warmth.

It was really just a matter of trying again and again until the filter for the magic to go through was correct. The magic was the same, it was just how it came out of your wand that mattered.

"I don't get it," he said miserably.

"That didn't work," she hummed. "So maybe less jerky on the wand then, with the swish and flick thing." She tried, then Neville tried. Once the feather jumped when she tried, but didn't hover.

"Oh, well done!" Professor Flitwick called suddenly, clapping. "Everyone see here, Miss Granger's done it!"

That group's feather was indeed flying towards the top of the classroom. Neville looked disheartened, but tried again anyway, to no avail. A few others tried, one other got his to fly, though not as high as Hermione's. Eventually Lily's jumped up violently, but then suddenly erupted into fire, making most of the room jump.

"Wingardium Leviosa," she said, swish flick. She thought how awesome it would be if she could make something fly with magic that lit like Christmas lights in her fingers every time she tried. "Win _gar_ dium Levi _o_ sa."

On that seemingly random try- Lexi was just trying again and again to feel the magic, switching back and forth with Neville, and yes she was trying to shift each time so it worked but still (she would probably get used to the magic someday but doubted it)- the feather lifted, as gently as it was supposed to, up above their heads, and followed the tip of her wand.

"Good, good, Ms. Talbot," Professor Flitwick said, just as excited as he had been for the last four or five people who managed it.

Eventually class ended, a majority still hadn't managed to make their feathers rise, and Neville's had jerked but it was hard to tell if it had been his spell or a random breeze from someone's sleeve.

…

The Halloween Feast started out with a bit more of a shock than Lily had expected, with thousands of bats swarming from the ceiling that she'd thought were only decorations and rushing in black clouds across the tables, rustling the decorations and making Jack o' Lanterns flicker.

And all at once the feast existed, materializing so suddenly Lily was almost surprised the table didn't groan in protest. Lexi grinned beside her at the food, or maybe the pumpkins, it was hard to tell, she really liked carved pumpkins for some reason, and Lily had hardly reached an apple pie piece when suddenly there was a commotion in the hall and the whole of Slytherin table, along with every other table, turned to look.

It was the DADA professor, Quirrel, looking absolutely horrified, clothes haphazard. Part of his left eye was covered by wilting turban. He bolted to Professor Dumbledore's seat at the head of the dining room and gasped, "Troll- in the dungeons- thought you ought to know."

He then sank to the floor in a dead faint.

There was an uproar, some concerned for the professor and some not even having heard but most generally losing their shit, especially the Slytherins, because they _lived_ in the Dungeons.

"A troll?" Lexi said loudly over the turmoil, face flushed. "A troll? Are those strong? Are they violent?"

Before Lily could answer or voice similar confusions, getting jostled on all sides, there was suddenly a loud split, several purple firecrackers exploding from the end of Professor Dumbledore's wand at the front of the room. The Hall fell mostly silent. Lexi was starting to tug on her sleeves with anxiety.

"Prefects," he rumbled, "lead your Houses back to the dormitories

immediately!"

Gemma Farley, a pale girl with dark hair, the Slytherin Prefect, instantly stood from where she'd been sitting at the very other end of the table. "Everyone let's go!" she barked. "First years, don't wander off! We'll have to be quick! Get out of my way, please!"

"Didn't they say it was _in_ the Dungeons?" Lexi asked frantically, grabbing her sleeve as they hustled.

 _"Pretty_ sure they did," she said too quickly, voice cracking.

"Maybe they're not dangerous?"

"No, they're violent," Lily said, remembering from time spent flipping absently through her DADA textbooks. "And dumb. A terrible combination."

"Maybe not the same dungeon as our dorms, then," she said, a little more weakly. Lily didn't respond, getting closer to the middle of the group so as not to be in the edge, effectively dragging Lexi with her.

If the troll _had_ been in the Dungeons, it wasn't for very long. At first, there had been suspicious noises banging nearby from some other room, echoing through the dungeons as a whole, pounding off the stone walls. A few first years squeaked, but otherwise they tried to stay as silent as they could shuffling down the halls as a herd. In the center of people, it was jostling, and Lexi gripped her sleeve like a handicap, but it was safer than the outer rings if a troll _did_ show up.

But the noises eventually faded, Gemma gave the password to the door, and they all pushed through the door at once, with no further incidence than a few lower-years getting trampled.

With the stone doors locked it felt considerably safer. The idea that a troll could even discern a door from a wall was ridiculous in the first place, since it was designed to be secret from anyone not a Slytherin to begin with, but it was still tense for a long, long while.

Even Pansy was quiet in the dorms, not saying much and eventually leaving for the common rooms to be with some of the other Slytherins huddled on watch by the doors.

Lexi seemed considerably more relaxed in the magical dorms than she had sneaking through the dungeon halls, but she still looked anxious, immediately taking her toad and sitting on Lily's bed where her cat Widdershins was curled up on the covers.

Blowing out a breath, Lily suddenly remembered that she'd snagged pastries from the table before Professor Quirrel had sent the room into a panic, and pulled them out of the pockets.

"Hey," she said. "Do you want a pasty? I grabbed a pumpkin by accident. I have so apple too, but those are mine, sorry."

Lexi's eyes flickered from the cat. "I don't like pumpkin," she said disagreeably, but still jumped up to take it and smiled. "Thanks."

She settled back down on the bed, taking the smallest bites Lily had ever seen anybody take from any kind of food, and she realized from the odd face her friend was making that she really _didn't_ like pumpkin pasties.

"Why'd you want it if you hate pumpkin?"

Lexi shrugged. "I dunno. Just want something to eat I guess."

Eventually Pansy came back with word of the troll having been killed, although no one was really sure how. Still, the atmosphere relaxed, even more than on a usual day. The others who tended to do so didn't tease or regale stories of teasing or any of the such.

Lexi abandoned half the pasty on the top of Iris' tank after feeding some to the toad, who didn't seem to much like it either, but she didn't say anything about it.

"I wonder how a troll got in," Lexi said thoughtfully. Widdershins had migrated with her to the bunk by the porthole window for attention, and Lexi pet her.

"Huh." Lily frowned from where she'd been getting ready for bed. "That's… a good question. Hogwarts has wards all over the school, so the only way it could've got in is if _all_ of the wards broke or-" her frown deepened. "Someone brought it in."

Lexi hesitated. "Unless someone had it locked up down here, it would've had to be brought in, Lily. Even if all the wards broke, _someone_ would've noticed a troll before it managed to get this far downstairs."

…

Sam was bored, and he couldn't sleep.

So instead of doing something productive, like homework or studying or even going through spells in his head, he went for a walk. He felt it a personal mission not to deal with schoolwork if at all necessary, and anyway he'd done this a million times anyway. If anything it helped him learn his way around the school when he scampered about, up and down the stairs and through the hallways and peeking behind piles and doors with glass windows for secrets and excitement.

He had his wand tucked up in his pocket and a pretty good idea of where all the possible escape routes were if Peeves came looking for fun or Mrs. Norris tried to rat him out again to Filch.

He explored for a while, coming across a few corridors twice or three times over on accident. Sam really wasn't going anywhere in particular except not outside, since it was cold and he hadn't worn anything particularly warm.

Mostly he just stumbled about in the dark, and fancied himself rather stealthy, only using Lumos when the threat of tumbling down the stairs was too high.

He was slightly less bored now, even if this particular walk hadn't yielded anything exciting. But he wasn't ready to go back to his dorm yet and see if his roommates had woken up to find him gone again- why did they care _so much_ about a couple house points, he could earn those back in Transfiguration or Flying easy.

He put a foot out to step off a stair, planning on meandering down a particularly dark hallway that looked promising enough, but then the staircase started to shift, and he pulled back quickly and he found himself being brought to a part of that floor he hadn't been to yet.

Knowing it was the way to the right hand side of the third floor corridor- the place Professor Dumbledore had forbidden anyone not keen on painful agonizing death. Sam peered down that way curiously, it seemed even darker than the one he'd gone for in the first place.

He could just wait on the step, wait for the stair to shift back over.

But what was the fun in that?

…

She didn't _mean_ to be out after hours, trying desperately not to be caught, begging that she would either find the way back down or find the stupid path to the library. She didn't _want_ to be breaking the rules or be wandering the school when she would rather be sleeping.

Lexi had just gotten nervous when Lily didn't come back from her trip to the library, when the sun went down and Slytherin house bunked to sleep and she was nowhere to be seen. Especially now that they were bouncing back and forth the idea that someone had let the troll into school- it could be dangerous after hours.

But at the same time, she didn't want to get her friend in trouble for being out after hours if she'd just lost track of time or something. And she'd been to the library enough times she'd thought herself capable of getting there on her own.

She'd been wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong, and now she'd been lost for hours and was at risk of getting caught by a Prefect or Head at any moment. Lexi couldn't even ask for help, couldn't duck into a classroom or call out for a ghost for help.

Peeking around a corner, trying to figure out if there were particularly congealed shadows that could be people or if she could risk using Lumos, a spell she'd learned two weeks ago and liked.

Lexi flinched, nearly actually jumping off the floor at the pounding sounds of running feet from behind her. She whirled, making to scramble backwards and probably fall into the dark corridor- and she was afraid of the dark but afraid of being caught more- but then there was an audible skidding noise when she made an involuntary squeak, and the hall went silent.

"Lexi?" came a familiar voice, surprised.

 _"Sam?"_

There was a sudden glow, and there was Sam's grinning face, the one that made him look like Peeves or maybe a mischievous elf.

"Perfect. I was literally going to- come on!"

"What? I-"

"Come look what I found," Sam said, jerking the glowing tip of his wand forward impatiently, but still sounding jovial enough. "Come on, hurry up before a Prefect comes by."

Lexi followed, curious despite herself, but also knowing Sam probably knew his way around better than she did. "What are you doing out here?"

"Exploring," he said cheerfully. "You?"

"Trying to find the library."

"At night?" Sam cast a skeptical look back over his shoulder at her, the high rise of his eyebrows slanted by the light of his wand.

She flushed despite herself. "I- I was looking for Lily," she confessed. "She went there earlier but she never came back. I thought I could find it."

"Got lost, huh? Explains why you're on the second floor. Follow me."

"Where are we going?"

"Third floor."

"What's on the third floor?" she said suspiciously, and yelped when the light went out suddenly, Sam flicking his wand down like he was trying to shake out a match.

"Shh! Questions later," he murmured, and grabbed her wrist to make her walk faster. And soon enough they were at the moving stairs, ones she'd never actually been to before for her classes.

He led her onto one, and they walked up it even though it was mid-shift, something the Head Girl had warned them never to do. But Lexi got the feeling Sam had done this before.

It clicked into place, and she went to step off, wincing at the noise the staircase made, but Sam held up a hand. "Wait, wait. Three cycles."

"What?"

"It'll go there, there and there three times," he said, pointing to floor ledges leading in various directions, likely to classrooms and offices. "And then it'll go over there."

He pointed randomly to another standard looking corridor. All the dark was making her nervous. "What's over there?"

"Something exciting," he said.

"Wait," she said a few minutes later, realizing at some point while she was trying to control her breathing and listen over the mild scraping of the stairs for signs of footsteps that this was the right corridor of the third floor. "Isn't this where Dumbledore said _not_ to go?"

"Yup."

"Said not to go if we didn't want to _die a horrible death?"_

"Yup."

"Why were you _exploring_ somewhere the professor said would cause a horrible _death?"_ Lexi demanded fiercely under her breath, but she was bewildered.

"I didn't mean to," he said. "But the stair went this way, so I figured why not."

"Why not? Death is why not-"

"Oh look, it stopped."

"What kind of exciting thing did you find up here Sam-"

"Don't worry so much," he said. "But don't wake it up."

Speechless, Lexi let herself be led down the frightening corridor, eyes pinging everywhere and head ringing with thoughts of what kind of creature Sam could have found that could cause painful death and would be sleeping right now.

Eventually they made their way to a plain looking if slightly larger door, and Lexi realized that's where this exciting thing would be. Of course it had to be locked, but Sam turned the knob without issue.

He raised a single finger to his lips for quiet, then opened the door.

Despite herself, Lexi peered inside, bracing to run away at the slightest scuff, shift or sensation of agonizing pain.

At first she didn't see anything, but then Sam went, _"Lumos Maxima."_ under his breath, and the room lit up, strangely angled, reflecting the light.

Oh God.

It was freaking Cerberus, she realized. The three headed hell-dog from Greek myths she'd read about. And it was _huge._

"Turn it off," she whispered hysterically, grabbing at his arm. "Turn the light off, turn the light off turn it off-"

"Shhshh, you'll wake it up-"

One single slit of one single eye on one single head peeled open on the massive animal, and the pupil visibly shrunk in Sam's powerful light.

Lexi noticed, suddenly, a weird square of wood paneling in the tile as a paw started to move. Just big enough to cover up a person-sized hole. It wasn't even seamed well, it stuck straight up out of the ground like a cellar door.

Then Sam slammed the door shut, and they both ran for their lives down the halls to the cacophony of three screaming dog heads pealing through the halls.

…

The library doors opened with a bang that Lily could hear from the restricted section. She jumped, sweeping the book she'd been looking at off the table and kicking it underneath it, hoping to dive away from the light of Filch or the librarian or whoever was here and hope they didn't see the book before she somehow got back to bed, the glow of her wand dying.

"Lily! Lily! Lily!"

She was surprised to hear two extremely familiar voices whispering loudly on the ground floor, and although she relaxed slightly, she was also confused. What were Sam and Lexi doing here?

"Lily! Lily come out, we've gotta go!"

"There's a dog-"

"We have to get back before they come looking!"

All this was said before she could even use Lumos again, rushed and flustered. And so she did, lighting her wand with a soft incantation and hurrying to pick the book up and put it away, not willing to call out, but eventually padding close enough that they saw her light.

Both of their faces were flushed, and although Lexi looked marginally more upset than Sam did, both looked rather put-off.

"Guys, guys. Chill. What?"

Both friends grabbed one of her arms without a word and hustled away, Sam careful to let the library doors close much quieter than they'd open, and Lily sighed a breath of relief. Getting locked inside without realizing the library was closing had been terrifying, but apparently it only locked from the inside.

Both of them shushed each other frantically in between trying to explain.

"I was looking for you and got lost, Sam-"

"She was wandering the halls, of course I had to show her- shh! Shh! Anyway I found this door-"

"Why would you _open-_ we went into the restricted area, the one Dumbledore said not to-"

"There was this giant dog-"

"Cerberus!"

 _"What?"_

"It had three heads and Sam woke it up-"

"Shut up, no I didn't-"

"Shh!"

Somehow they made it back without getting caught, and Lily had managed to glean most of the story. Upon arriving they snuck back into Slytherin House and into their dorm, Sam climbing back through Lexi's trunk and to his own without waking up Pansy.

She didn't sleep well, to say the least.

…

They were back at Gryffindor table, with hopefully enough chatter around them not to be overheard as they quietly panicked over what was going on.

First of all, there was no doubt someone was hiding something.

"You're _sure_ you saw a trapdoor?"

"Well, yeah, I think so," she said. "It was sleeping near it, but I noticed it when it started to get up. Really light wood, super old looking, I guess, but it didn't look like it was supposed to be there."

"I didn't see it," Sam said unhelpfully. "I was more focused on its face. Faces."

"So when Dumbledore told us not to go up there if we didn't want to die, he must've meant that thing," Lily said. "But what's it hiding?"

"We don't even know that that's the thing he was talking about," Lexi said nervously. "I mean, Sam got through that door with _Alohomora._ I know I'm muggle-born but that's still a pretty basic spell."

"So?" Sam shrugged.

"So what's it hiding?"

"Does it have something to do with that troll?" Lily suggested. "Maybe it was a distraction. Or maybe it was even another guard that got loose."

"Maybe someone's trying to get through that trapdoor," Sam said, serious now. "We don't have any clue what's in it, if it's bad enough to kill someone-"

"Why is it in the school?" Lexi burst out, then quieted when a few people looked over. "If it's so dangerous-"

"Hogwarts is one of the safest places in the wizarding world," Sam said. "It makes sense, I guess. But if somebody's trying to steal it, they _must_ be a student or a professor."

"We should tell someone," Lexi said immediately. "Professor Dumbledore or-"

"We can't," Lily said, shaking her head. "You both would get in trouble for being out after hours _and_ going to a restricted area. Besides, what if we tell the person trying to steal it by accident?"

Lexi looked uncomfortable, but didn't argue.

Breakfast passed in an unusual silence for the three of them.

And second of all, there was a traitor in their midst: and who knew what they were trying to steal.

...

...

...

Hi there! Redhead here! So Pikapixie was working on this with me at my place when she was grounded from life, so we couldn't post it until now. But since we wrote this on my computer I'm just gonna post it at my place instead of emailing her the word doc.

SO I thought it might also be a good idea to clarify, that Lily's (the character/younger version of myself) near beat down on Malfoy during flying was not an uncommon occurrence in my younger years. What I mean is that the whole line of-

" **She'd seen bullies before** , but Malfoy might have been one of the worst, like a villain straight out of a novel, almost _too_ slimy. **And she'd fought bullies for _much less_ than this**."

Yeah that wasn't an exaggeration, so don't be calling me a vigilante Mary Sue...

Please review!


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